


The Pogue Lyfe T-Shirt Company

by YellowLaboratory



Category: Outer Banks (TV)
Genre: Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Suicide, JJ (Outer Banks) Deserves Better, Pre-Season/Series 01, They all deserve better, the prequel no one asked for
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-09
Updated: 2021-02-25
Packaged: 2021-03-04 20:21:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 26
Words: 189,190
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25172296
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/YellowLaboratory/pseuds/YellowLaboratory
Summary: Before the buried treasure and missing parents, John B Routledge meets John James Maybank in a third grade classroom. The Outer Banks will never be the same.Or, the full (non-canon) history of the pogues based on throw-away lines and an over analysis of every interaction ever.
Relationships: JJ & Kiara & Pope & John B. Routledge, JJ/Kiara (Outer Banks), Sarah Cameron/John B. Routledge
Comments: 308
Kudos: 383





	1. John B & JJ

**Author's Note:**

> This started out with me writing down a list of throwaway lines and interactions in Outer Banks that I thought could build the backstory of the Pogues and it turned into … this. There will be several more chapters. Do I know how many chapters? No. I currently have most of the story written out in one long document and I’m trying to find natural breakpoints that don't seem to exist. I would post it all in one go but it’s currently 60k words of (mostly) unedited garbage, which seems like a little much to throw at any given reader.
> 
> Eventually, all the characters will be involved and this will go almost all the way to the start of the show. There aren’t really any romantic relationships in this story (because there aren’t any established relationships in the beginning of the show) but I lean pretty heavily on JJ/Kiara. It's going to be slightly overdramatic, kind of like the source material, so get ready for that. 
> 
> Anyways, each chapter is going to be based on one or more lines/interactions from the show that I wanted to build upon. Today, we are focusing on the line where John B mentions that JJ has been his best friend since 3rd grade, my personal headcanon that JJ is also named John, how they both got their nicknames, and a little bit on the relationships between Big John and John B, Big John and JJ, and JJ and both of his parents.

It’s a bright day in late summer when Marissa Sanders meets her match. Fresh out of college, Marrissa was elated to finally have a classroom of her own. A school on the poor side of Kildare Island was less than optimal, but she was renting a relatively nice house on the water and she had a livable salary. Overall, she was fine. She wasn’t about to complain.

As with her years as a student, the first day of school brought about all the same nerves and jitters. But things were different this year. Now, she was in charge, which brings about a whole new slew of fears and trepidation. 

But she was also prepared. She had her curriculum binder completely ready, she had decorated her new room over the summer, and her boyfriend had gotten her a small plaque for her desk that labeled her as ‘Miss Sanders.’ The small sign gave her a thrill because she was finally ready to do it. She was ready to be a real life teacher. 

Except… she wasn’t. As a first time teacher, she was bound to miss something. And that something came in the form of a seating chart for her third grade class. Four years of college and she forgot a _seating chart._

The worst part is, she didn’t even notice she was missing something until she was in the teacher’s lounge on the morning of the first day of school. She was printing off a ‘Get To Know Me’ worksheet that her students were going to spend the majority of the first lesson working on, and she overheard some of the veteran teachers discussing their seating arrangements. 

“I just gave up this year. I’m seating them alphabetically.” One of the veteran teachers said, and every bone in Marissa’s body froze as she realized she hadn’t thought of seating. She whispered a string of expletives unfit for a third grade teacher’s mouth as her mind raced. Marissa didn’t get a chance to hear the rest of the conversation as she rushed to her classroom and thought ‘ _how could I forget a seating chart!’_

By the time her third grade class entered her new classroom, she had set up a seating arrangement - it was alphabetical, taking note from the veteran teacher she had heard in the lounge, but by _first_ name rather than last name. She had thought, in her mad dash to put something together in the 15 minutes before her students arrived, that alphabetical by first name would make it seem like she had put a little bit of thought into the arrangement, rather than just put them alphabetically by last name. It was also convenient that her excel spreadsheet of students was already ordered alphabetically by first name. Not that it had any bearing on her decision. None at all.

She had dashed from the lounge to her classroom, quickly copied and pasted all the names from her excel document into a word document, breezed through a few clicks to create a nearly disgusting display of word art, and then made another mad dash to get the name tags printed and laminated before her kids arrived. The entire exercise left Marissa out of breath and too frazzled to even notice the fact that her classroom had _three (3)_ Johns and she had seated them _right next to each other!_ That particular shock wouldn’t come until roll call, right after all the students found their seats and settled in. 

That was the day John Redfield and John Routledge met John Maybank. By the time Marissa realized the error, she was in too deep to turn back. She was already desperately trying to maintain her composure in a room full of noisy third graders when she really just wanted to go to the bathroom and cry for a solid ten minutes, and the first day of school had only begun 15 minutes ago. She allowed herself a minute after attendance to stare in abject horror at the back wall while she tried to figure out how to deal with the three boys seated right next to each other with the same name. After that minute, she finally shook herself out of it and she realized she was panicking for no good reason - even though there were three Johns in her class ( _thanks, administration_ ) and they all sat next to each other, it wasn’t necessarily a disaster. She just needed to calm down and maintain control of the situation and she would be _fine._ She had four years of training to deal with this! No one was more capable then she was! 

Marissa chanted this in her head as she decided she could call all the boys by first and last name, and it would be fine. 

Except, of course, it was not fine. It took one hour long lesson - not even a full school day - for Marissa to decide first and last names was _not_ an ideal option. It takes one lesson for her to want to pull her hair out - before she can even get the word ‘ _John'_ out of her mouth _,_ three separate mischievous boys answer her at the same time with varying levels of accuracy in their answers. The lesson isn’t even particularly interactive - the students spend most of it working independently on her ‘Getting to Know Me’ worksheet and then sharing it with a buddy. Even so, she somehow manages to call the name _‘John'_ about a hundred times. Seriously, isn’t there _any_ other name on this island?

During recess, she talks to the three Johns about waiting until they hear their last name before answering so she can ensure that everyone in the class is participating. They look at her with blank stares as if they aren’t sure what she means, but nod when she reiterates that she wants them to wait until they hear their last name. 

For the rest of the first day and onto the second day of class, she still tries calling them by their first and last name. It doesn’t get any easier. For some reason, John Routledge can be an overwhelming amount of syllables, even though all the boys only have two syllables in their last names. Marissa doesn’t know how to describe it, but Routledge just feels more ungangly than the rest of the names. John Redfield, for his part, almost always screams out the answer before she can call on Maybank or Routledge, despite their discussion the day before. She tries not to hang her head in exasperation everytime he does it, but it’s always a close call. And even if she calls on Maybank, he won’t answer. He’ll look at her until she points to him again, and he’ll say ‘ _oh'_ like he’s surprised she’s talking to him. Overall, it’s a disaster.

By the third day of classes, the three Johns have the poor woman worn out enough that she says to hell with first and last names and tries to figure out nicknames for the boys. When they march into class, she approaches their desks and crouches down so she is on eye level with them. She explains, as simply as she can, that she needs nicknames for them. She had spent the last two nights ranting to her boyfriend about the three Johns, and between the two of them, they had yet to devise a naming convention that would work. Her boyfriend had originally suggested calling them by their first name and last initials, but Redfield and Routledge start with the same letter, so there would still be two John R’s. At this point, she’s desperately hoping that the boys have nicknames, or different middle names, or _something_ she can work with.

“My dad calls me Bird, Miss Sanders.” John Routledge says helpfully. For a second, Marissa actually considers it. She’s really that desperate at this point. But something about it gives her pause, and she shakes her head quickly. Calling him ‘Bird’ in the middle of class just feels weird. It seems weirdly intimate in a parent-and-child kind of way, and she’s not sure she’s comfortable encroaching on that sacred bond. Plus, she’s fairly certain if she called out ‘Bird’ in the middle of class, half the class would be looking to the windows for the animal. It’s not exactly a perfect nickname for a classroom full of easily distracted eight year olds.

“What about your middle name?” Marrissa asks the Routledge kid, and he shrugs. 

“Booker.” The Routledge kid responds, and then she nods. 

“Could we call you John B?” She asks, and he nods at her absentmindedly, twirling his pencil in his hands. She sighs. It’ll have to do.

“Okay, you’ll be John B. John Redfield, what’s your middle name?” She turns to the Redfield kid, who helpfully informs her that his middle name is Jacob. So far, so good. John B and John J are not unreasonable nicknames for the kids.

“What about you, John Maybank, what’s your middle name?” She says, turning to the last of the Johns.

“James.” The Maybank kid says, and Marissa is ready to quit. They don’t even have different _initials_. Can she write a complaint to the maternity ward at the local hospital? A letter to the editor of the Kildare Gazette? _Stop Naming Your Kids The Same Thing, Says Local Teacher._

She’s trying to figure out any way to quickly distinguish the three boys from each other when John Maybank offers up another helpful tidbit: “My mom calls me JJ.”

Class should have begun 10 minutes ago, she has a lesson plan to start, and the Maybank kid just gave her an out. She runs with it. She decides the three of them are John J, John B, and JJ. The three Johns from third grade. The names stick incredibly easily after they are decided, almost like it’s meant to be. The boys don’t have trouble understanding who she’s talking about, and she has absolutely no trouble remembering which boy is which. After the third day of classes, the nicknames become commonplace, and Marissa doesn’t think too much about it. She doesn’t realize it, but the nicknames she so desperately sought on the third day of third grade stick around for a very long time.

And for most of third grade, the three Johns are inseparable, much to the dismay of anyone trying to keep the school in any form of working order. But John J moves after a hurricane washes his house away and then it’s just two Johns. But the nicknames stay, and so does the friendship. 

They become friends because they sit next to each other, but by the end of third grade, John B and JJ are more brothers than friends. It starts because they are both eight year old little boys who like to mess with their new teacher. It’s harmless pranks, laughing over inside jokes during quiet reading time, and a territorial claim over the playground. 

It continues with simple play dates at the Chateau and short days on John B’s dad’s boat. Slowly, the playdates become an everyday occurrence, the short days on the boat become long days just hanging around, and JJ’s mom’s number is programmed into Big John’s cell phone so he can call when JJ wants to stay on the pull out couch. And JJ always wants to stay on the pull out couch. 

At first, Big John can’t really figure out why - the Chateau isn’t objectively better than the Maybank’s house, and JJ’s one of the few kids around the Cut that still has both his parents in his life. He doesn’t think too much about it, though, because having JJ around makes John B happy and they can occupy themselves for hours. Big John has always felt that John B was a little lonely after Clarise left - not having his mom around left an emotional hole in both of them. Big John had always tried to be around for John B, but it’s always felt somewhat empty just being the two of them. 

JJ’s a ball of chaotic energy masquerading as an eight year old boy. Whatever space seemed empty in the Chateau before his arrival is overshadowed by the boy's quick wit and impulsive nature. Big John doesn’t take to JJ right away, but after a few fishing lessons and grilled cheeses, Big John starts thinking that JJ might be alright. Both him and John B are less lonely when he’s around. 

Big John can also sense that JJ doesn’t _really_ trust him. JJ and John B are close and trust each other in the way only third graders can manage - immediately and completely, without fear of betrayal or the future. But JJ looks at Big John sideways sometimes and makes sure to stay out of his way if it’s not apparent he’s in a good mood. Big John can guess what that is a symptom of, but the kid doesn’t show up with bruises and, despite being constantly hungry, the kid seems to be well taken care of. Big John isn’t an encyclopedia of knowledge on childhood development - hell, he’s not even a particularly good parent - but he thinks JJ should be alright. He just makes sure to smile at JJ as soon as the boy comes in the door, because when he smiles, the kid relaxes.

He doesn’t think much of the odd relationship JJ seems to have with any authority figure - he knows Luke Maybank because they went to grade school together, and Rose Maybank introduced herself to him one of the first times Big John dropped JJ off at his house. He knows Luke is difficult, but Rose seems stable enough. He thinks he may be reading too much into the boy's behavior. 

Until the boy shows up on his front porch, drenched from the pouring rain and looking like he’d cried the entire way from his house. 

“Hey, kiddo. What’s up?” Big John says, making sure to smile as he coaxes the kids inside. Big John may not be a third grader anymore, but he grew up in the same neighborhood as JJ and he knows that pushing the kid too far will drive him away. 

The smile doesn’t work it’s usual magic to calm JJ. In fact, Big John’s pretty sure JJ doesn’t even notice his smile. He just stares straight ahead before asking Big John “Can I stay here tonight?” 

“Sure thing, JJ. Hey, Bird! Can you get some extra clothes for JJ?” He yells down the hallway, trying not to imagine why JJ flinches when he yells. 

John B comes running out of his room when he hears his best friend’s name, and he’s shocked to see the boy. 

“JJ! What are you doing here?” John B says, his excitement clear. JJ doesn’t say anything for a beat, and Big John reminds his son about the clothes. The reminder seems to signal to John B that this is somewhat serious, and the boy just nods. 

“Clothes. Right.” He says, turning back into his room. JJ has his arms wrapped around his small, skinny self, already shivering as his rain soaked clothes cool in the air. 

Big John moves towards the kitchen, ready to stir up a pot of hot chocolate, when John B returns from his room. 

“Here you go, JJ.” John B says, and JJ accepts the sweatpants and t-shirt. 

“Feel free to take a shower!” Big John says as the boy moves to the bathroom. Big John’s not sure he’s going to take him up on the offer until he hears the shower turn on. He knows eight year old boys aren’t the height of hygiene, so he almost thought the boy would turn it down. 

“What happened?” John B says as he approaches the stove top, and Big John shrugs. 

“He was just outside, he didn’t say.” Big John says, stirring milk and cocoa powder in a saucepan. It’s not the most impressive culinary feat, but Big John thinks it might make JJ feel better. Maybe a grilled cheese, too. “Don’t ask him about it.” Big John says after a minute. “JJ will tell you when he’s ready.” 

John B nods sagely at that, and the two boys stand silently in the kitchen for a second, the sound of the water in the bathroom the only noise. 

“Here, stir this until I get back.” Big John says, handing John B the wooden spoon he was using for the hot chocolate. “Don’t burn yourself.” He reminds the boy. 

“Where are you going?” John B asks as he takes the spoon, and Big John sighs loudly before turning to his cell phone. 

“Gotta make a call, kid.” He says as he pushes through the door of the Chateau. 

It’s worse than he thought - she doesn’t pick up until the third try, and her voice is biting over the sound of yelling in the background. 

“What?!” Rose Maybank says, and Big John nearly recoils at her tone. Rose Maybank is not a biting woman - she’s softly spoken and quick to laugh. Big John has seen her a few times, and she’s never appeared to be anything other than perfectly pleasant. She’s got JJ’s blonde hair and blue eyes framed by skin so tan you’d think it was fake - not that the Maybank’s would spend money on something so frivolous as a spray tan. Not that the Maybank’s had money to spend on something so frivolous as a spray tan. She’s the kind of soft, lovely person that doesn’t last long on the Cut. 

“Uh, sorry Rose. Just wanted to let you know that JJ’s over at my place.” Big John says. He’s kind of surprised Rose can even hear him. Big John can hear Luke yelling in the background, and something smashes. 

Rose sighs, exasperated. “Yeah, okay, fine. Just send him home when you get sick of him.” 

Rose usually ends their conversations that way - normally it’s a playful tone. Now, her voice is anything but playful. It’s tight and stressed and rising above a cacophony of rage from Luke Maybank. 

“He’ll probably spend the night, then.” Big John says. _Might never leave,_ he wants to add, but doesn’t. He may not be a social debutante from Figure Eight, but he knows some manners. “Do you need anything, Rose?” 

“ _No.”_ Her answer is sharp and quick. “Just - if JJ needs anything, let me know.” She says, before the phone clicks off. Big John’s shocked for a minute by the conversation, staring at the blank screen in front of him. He takes a minute to collect himself before he walks in. By the time he enters the kitchen again, John B’s in danger of scalding the milk. 

“Woo, Bird, you gotta turn that off.” Big John says, rushing to John B’s side to remove the saucepan from the heat and turn off the stove. 

“Sorry.” John B says as Big John rushes to make sure the milk isn’t scalded. 

“It’s no problem.” Big John says absentmindedly as he stirs the milk and decides it’s safe to drink. “You just gotta make sure the milk doesn’t get too hot, or it won’t taste good.” 

Neither boy notices JJ watching the interaction, until Big John turns to grab a trio of mugs. 

“Ah, JJ’s out of the shower!” He says, trying to find three clean mugs in the cupboard. It’s a little bit of a struggle, but he eventually finds some that are in acceptable condition. He pours the drink into each mug, handing one to each of the boys and keeping one for himself because, hey, he’s the one that made it. He might as well enjoy it. 

Big John then settles himself in the middle of the couch and both boys climb to sit on either side of him. Big John’s been busy trying to get through all of _Cheers,_ and he left the tape in the television set from the last time he got a minute to himself to watch anything. He decides it's as good a thing as any to distract the boys, so he lets it play as the three of them drink hot chocolate. 

Big John goes to bed early that night, cause he’s gotta be out on the water before sunrise. He leaves the two boys cuddled on the couch, empty mugs on the coffee table and eyes glued to the television with a reminder to go to bed at a reasonable time. He wakes up to see the boys in much the same position - slumped against each other, clearly having fallen asleep before they had the good sense to set up the pull out couch. Big John shakes John B awake lightly, tries to get him to move into his own room so he’ll have at least a few good hours of sleep before school, but the boy just shrugs off his attempts to wake him up. Big John stops for fear of waking up JJ, and just sets an alarm for 7:30 so the boys will wake up for school. He leaves a note on the kitchen counter and two hastily made lunches in the fridge so the boys will have something for lunch. God knows they aren’t going to make anything for themselves. 

When Big John gets home later that night, John B sits on the counter while he heats up pasta sauce and boils noodles for dinner. 

“You were right, dad.” John B says in one of the long stretches of silence. Big John’s busy stirring dried basil into the sauce, trying to make it taste decent. He’s not too picky to eat the jarred sauce plain, but sometimes a little seasoning can go along way. He’s also almost 100% sure the basil didn’t go bad. He’s pretty sure, at least. It smells like basil, so how bad could it be?

“Oh yeah?” Big John says, not really paying attention as he tries to decide how much basil is too much basil. 

“JJ told me what happened after you went to bed.” John B says quieter, and that piques Big John’s interest. 

“He did?” Big John says, turning to face John B. John B nods and looks at his hands. 

“I didn’t ask him, like you said, and he told me before we fell asleep.” John B says, and Big John’s thankful that he managed to read the situation well enough to give John B the right advice. 

“Some people don’t like being asked directly about things. It can make them feel like they are cornered.” Big John says, turning back to his hopeless disaster of a sauce. 

“Cornered?” John B questions, and Big John nods without looking at him. 

“Yeah, like someone is trapping them. Like they don’t have an option to get away.” Big John explains, and John B mulls over that for a second as Big John tastes the sauce. 

“He said his parents were fighting.” John B says after a moment. “He doesn’t like to be home when his parents fight. I guess it’s loud and he can’t sleep.”

Big John lets out a breath, because he’s thankful the kid didn’t get hurt before coming over. Big John had tried to subtly check for bruising or a limp or something, but he couldn’t see anything last night. He also knows that there are kids and parents on the Cut that are far too good at hiding what’s really going on. 

But if JJ told John B he was scared of his parents fighting - not that he was scared for his own safety - it put a tiny part of Big John’s mind at ease. It’s not a bullet proof exoneration on the Maybank parents, but it’s significantly closer to something Big John might be able to help JJ with. 

“I told him he could come over here whenever his parents fought.” John B says when Big John doesn’t respond, and Big John nods.

“Damn straight, kid. JJ’s always welcome here. This house is as much yours as it is his, in my opinion.” Big John says. He had friends that would have needed a safe place in grade school, and his parents were always hesitant to let them stay over. He wouldn’t be a gatekeeper to someone’s safe space - especially not someone who he loved as much as the Maybank kid. He’d make sure both boys knew that JJ had a place in the Chateau. John B smiled at his dad, visibly relaxing at his words. 

It wasn’t the last time JJ showed up at the Chateau unannounced. It wasn’t the last time Big John cooked up something comforting or warm and left the boys to either fall asleep on the couch or find their way to their own beds. It’s not the last time Big John woke up to find them slumped over one another on the couch. 

It was the first time Big John considered JJ to be another son.


	2. Kiara

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! I am back with Chapter 2. Thank you for the comments and kudos! I can’t tell you how much I appreciate it. 
> 
> In this chapter, Kiara is introduced. Most of what I have read has Kiara joining the Pogues last, after Pope, JJ, and John B are already friends, but I thought it would be a little interesting to imagine it a different way. This also goes over what happened with JJ’s mom, why JJ and his dad hate the cops so much.
> 
> Additionally, this is the actual start of the Pogues and the Pogue Lyfe T-Shirt Company (which I took from episode 5, when they are sitting around the fire after Midsummers and Kie yells at John B “what about Pogue Lyfe? what about the t-shirt company, bro?”). I actually think the Pogue/Kook thing is ingrained pretty deeply in the culture of the island - adults and teenagers alike use it, so I don’t think any of the Core Four came up with it. But for the purposes of this story, I liked the way this fell together.
> 
> Anyways, I hope you guys enjoy this chapter!

When JJ and John B are in fifth grade, JJ starts demanding to be called John again. There’s no real reason for the nickname JJ anyway - John J moved away, and John B took to his nickname like a moth to a lantern. JJ can just be John now, because there’s no reason to differentiate him anymore. Or at least, that’s how JJ explains it to John B. John B doesn’t get it at first - he stumbles his way through sentences, trying to address the boy in front of him as anything other than _JJ_ \- but he begins to understand what’s going on when he realizes JJ’s mom has disappeared. John B’s mom disappeared a while ago, and it’s not exactly an uncommon occurrence on the Cut for parents to take a week or so to themselves. In fact, Luke Maybank is famous for his month long disappearances. But Rose Maybank hasn’t so much as left the island since JJ was born, much less disappeared for any amount of time. While Luke was unstable and flighty, Rose did everything she could to keep JJ in a stable home with as normal an upbringing as she could manage. 

Until she didn’t. Until, some day in early August, when JJ came home from the Chateau to see his mom’s white mini van not in the driveway. It’s not entirely unusual for her to be gone - she could be at the grocery store or maybe picking up an odd job babysitting to pay for JJ’s new school supplies - and JJ doesn’t think much of it. For that matter, neither does Luke. The Maybanks don’t pay for two cell phones, and because Luke is usually the one out and about on some job or another, he’s the sole owner of the cell phone. If Rose leaves the house, she will usually call Luke before from the house phone to let him know or leave a note or something. There’s no missed calls or notes, but Luke and JJ don’t immediately assume the worst. Normally, she’d be home by eleven from a babysitting gig, anyways, and a night without mom is a night for JJ and Luke to make the boxed mac and cheese that Rose hates and watch cartoons. 

Luke begins to worry at 11:00. He calls the police at midnight. They ask him if he is sure she didn’t leave a note, or tell him where she was going. When he tells them no, they tell him they can’t do anything about a missing persons case until the morning, but they’ll send a patrol car around to make sure her car is not broken down somewhere. A cop shows up at the house, despite the dispatcher’s insistence that they can’t do anything. JJ is half asleep when he hears strange voices discussing something about _running away_ in hushed tones in the kitchen. 

“Don’t say that, Shoupe. My boy’s asleep in his room - I won’t have you waking him up with lies about his mama.” Luke says, and the other voice apologizes. 

JJ’s asleep again when the cop asks to see Luke and Rose’s room, and he’s asleep when they realize Rose took nothing with her - wherever she went. 

They don’t find Rose’s minivan until the next morning, because they were absolutely not looking in the parking lot by the wharf. But there it is parked, as if she walked out of the car and onto the ferry for a day trip to the mainland. 

Except no one has heard from her, and no one knows where she was going, and she took nothing with her, besides maybe a couple hundred dollars she kept in a shoe box in her closet. 

And given the nature of the situation, and the nature of the Cut, the cops aren’t entirely sure Rose Maybank ever left the island. It’s no secret that Rose and Luke weren’t a perfect couple - despite their best efforts, they both fought viciously, often violently, with each other. They each had different affairs at different times. It just so happened that Luke had happened to have a particularly steamy affair that same summer, and he had all the motive to want to get rid of his wife. 

The police are relentless in their interrogation. They spend hours trying to get Luke to admit to a crime he didn’t commit. They interview JJ for hours as well, trying to get him to corroborate their portrait of his father as an abusive husband turned potential murderer. It’s a month of media coverage, visits to the police station, and search parties. It’s the start of JJ’s deep distrust of cops.

And then, Rose Maybank calls the police station. Not her son, not her husband. She calls the police station. She tells them she left, that she is safe and healthy but far away. Of course, the cops don’t believe her, and she has to go to a police station near her new home to ensure this isn’t an impersonator. 

She’s not an impersonator - Rose Maybank really called out of the blue after a month long search. Luke begs to talk with her, but she denies him that. She asks the cops not to share her location, which they don’t. No one in the Outer Banks hears from Rose again. It’s the type of obscure but incredibly odd missing persons case that True Crime podcasters cover after they’ve nearly run out material. As JJ grows older, he’ll listen to those podcasts and wonder why no one discusses the little boy she left with an increasingly angry father. 

John B and JJ aren’t quite old enough at the time to understand all the implications of the situation. All John B knows is when JJ walks into school with a bruise on his arm, demanding to be called John again, John B complies. When John B tells Big John, he just hangs his head for a second before nodding. Big John is one of the only adults to take the situation as seriously as John B. Big John doesn’t so much as think about the nickname in the boy’s presence. 

Even though Big John complies, not everyone else is so easy to convince. Even their fifth grade teachers have been yelling at JJ in the hallway for years, and all his peers are reluctant to start calling him John again. It’s a tedious, repetitive process of correcting everyone they come in contact with for weeks on end. John B does it because it makes JJ less sad, and JJ does it because any reminder of his mother nearly sends him to tears as he thinks about soft hands and police interrogation rooms and fresh laundry and his dad telling him ‘ _mom left your sorry ass, boy’._

That is, until John B introduces him as ‘the other John’ to his new science partner, Kiara Carerra. John B is just trying to respect JJ’s wishes, but JJ’s tired of explaining to everyone that he wants to be called John now. He's already beginning to disassociate his mother with the nickname. She’s been gone for months at that point, and the nickname doesn’t bring tears to his eyes anymore. He gives up and tells Kiara to call him JJ, and just like that, the nickname is back. John B looks at him in shock, but JJ waves him off. John B tries to ask him if he’s sure he wants to be called JJ, and JJ tells him not to make a big deal. 

It’s almost too easy for everyone to fall back on calling him JJ, teachers and peers alike. Big John doesn’t miss a beat slipping back into the nickname once John B tells him what happens. Both Routledge boys spend a good couple of hours trying to decipher the change in JJ’s behaviour, but they aren’t sure what triggers it. It just seems like he’s sick of correcting everyone. The nickname from third grade stuck like glue.

Kiara sticks around too, which JJ doesn’t like at first. He figures Kiara’s just one of the girls with a crush on John B. It’s the start of middle school dating, and even in fifth grade, the girls are already flocking around John B. These girls piss off JJ, because they just generally get in the way. They just want to talk to John B, and they cheer loudly whenever John B does literally anything. A small crowd of them will come over to fish with him and you would think John B caught a winning touchdown in the Superbowl for all the cheering he gets when he pulls up a pogue. JJ wants fun and shenanigans and mischief, and all the girls around John B seem immune to anything JJ would consider fun.

But Kiara’s not like that. On the first day John B invites her over, Kiara sticks with JJ despite all his best efforts. He tells her to bug off, and she absolutely refuses. 

“Aren’t you going to go watch John B fish?” He asks as he tries to start up a fire. 

“Why would anyone want to watch John B fish?” She says, sitting in the dirt next to him. She’s taller than JJ, all long limbs she can’t quite coordinate yet. JJ thinks it’s a good thing she’s smart enough to see through the John B mania that’s happening on the dock, but it’ll take more than that to impress him. 

“I’m going to go swimming.” He says suddenly, abandoning his place at the attempted fire and walking immediately to the dock. If there’s one thing he knows about girls - or at least the girls who hang around John B - is that they are just starting to wear makeup and they will not go into the water under any circumstances. 

Kiara is startled for a second at JJ’s quick departure, but she’s up like a shot and following him to the water as soon as she regains her wits. JJ’s not surprised to hear her behind him, but he is shocked to hear her follow him past the fishing watch-party and towards the end of the dock, where he has every intention of jumping off. He rips off his shirt quickly, and jumps in the water before he can contemplate what Kiara is doing. 

Kiara emerges out of the water a second after he does, and he has to say, her jumping into the water is kind of impressive to him. Just a little, though. Kiara gives him a look that tells him she’s onto him. 

“You think water’ll scare me?” She asks, and then she splashes him and dives under the water to avoid his counterattack. 

Okay, JJ’s a little amazed. It must show on his face, because when Kiara resurfaces a few feet away, she laughs loudly. 

This draws the attention of the John B Fan Club, and one of the girls standing close to John B states loudly “Ewww, Kiara is swimming with the fish!” The other girls laugh, and John B tells them to knock it off. It quiets them for a second, but Kiara eyes are raging mad when JJ turns to look at her. Something about the girls on the dock, who won’t do anything even remotely cool, making fun of Kiara doesn’t sit right with him. When JJ makes eye contact with her, he has a dangerous gleam in his eyes. Kiara looks at him quizzically, but JJ just smiles. “Just follow along, if you aren’t too scared.” 

Kiara perks up at the dare, and she tells him “I am _never_ too scared.” JJ laughs, and then he looks at the dock where the group has gone back to watching John B. 

“Ouch!” JJ yells suddenly, getting the attention of Kiara and everyone on the dock. Kiara looks at him in shock. 

“What happened? Are you okay?” The smile JJ gives her is lost on John B and his friends, but Kiara understands that _oh, okay, this is what I’m supposed to follow._

“Something bit me!” JJ yells, and John B has abandoned his fishing rod and is approaching the end of the dock where Kiara and JJ jumped in. 

“What do you mean-” John B starts to say, but he’s cut off by Kiara. 

“Ouch! Oh my god, something bit me too!” She yells, and the entire act is almost ruined by JJ’s giddy grin at the fact that Kiara not only caught on to his scheme but was playing along. 

“Guys, maybe you should get out of the -” John B is interrupted, yet again, by JJ throwing his hands above his head, yelling indistinctively, and then ducking his head below water quickly. Kiara gives it a few seconds, allows John B the proper time to freak out, before she follows in JJ’s footsteps, yelling loudly about something and then splashing wildly until her head is under water. She can’t see JJ underwater, but she’s positive he’s smiling. 

She feels someone grab her under her arms and drag her to the surface after a second, and she realizes that John B risked an unknown assailant to jump into the water and drag her up. Maybe these boys aren’t so bad. 

JJ follows closely behind them, his head breaking the surface and his eyes immediately finding Kiara’s as John B desperately tries to drag both of them to the dock and out of the water. 

JJ breaks out into hysterical laughter as soon as he sees Kiara and she follows suit. John B pauses his rescue mission to look at them both, and as soon as he connects the dots, he’s yelling at them for scaring him and dunking both of them underwater several times. The girls on the dock don’t know what to make of the trio as they emerge from the water shivering, wrapping themselves in towels and laughing. 

“Did you see John B’s face?” JJ says to Kiara, and she laughs so hard in response that she snorts, which only makes JJ laugh harder. John B shakes his head, ready to throw the both of them back in the water. He threatens as much, and Kiara composes herself enough to retaliate. 

“Yeah, you’re gonna throw us back like the pogues you keep catching off this dock?” She says, and JJ’s howling laughter starts all over again because this skinny girl just roasted the crap out of John B’s fishing skills. John B scoffs at Kiara and JJ and returns to his fan club, but JJ and Kiara are still laughing so hard tears are coming out of their eyes. 

“Okay, Kiara. You may not be terrible.” JJ says after a minute, and Kiara rolls her eyes at him. 

“Gee, thanks.” She says, and JJ flashes her another toothy grin. She shivers a little in the cold autumn air, and without really thinking, JJ offers to make the two of them hot cocoa to warm up. Her eyes light up at the mention of hot cocoa, and five minutes later, JJ and Kiara are standing around the stove in the Chateau as JJ demonstrates how to correctly make hot chocolate. 

“You have to keep stirring it, and you have to make sure it doesn’t get too hot or else the milk will taste bad.” JJ says, and Kiara nods as she watches him stir. 

“Is it always like this?” Kiara says to JJ, as she searches around for two mugs. “Cause I might not come back if all he does is fish and show off to Alyssa.”

“No, somedays him and I hang out without all the girls and it’s better.” JJ says and Kiara nods quietly. “You know, if you want, sometime, you could come over when the John B Fan Club isn’t here and we can do something that is actually fun.” 

JJ doesn’t really know why he offers. John B is his best friend and he really hates sharing him. When JJ and John B hang out, he doesn’t have to worry about what John B thinks or if John B is going to bring up his mom - it’s just the two of them and whatever shenanigans they can get up to. Normally, JJ asks John B to stop inviting people so they can have a day without the John B Fan Club, and he’s loathed to add anyone to their friendship. But something about the thought of not hanging out with Kiara again makes JJ sad. When Kiara smiles at him, he knows he made the right decision. 

“If they are John B’s Fan Club, can we be John B’s Pogues?” She says, a conspiratorial look in her eyes. JJ laughs and tells Kiara absolutely. 

They drink their hot chocolate around the fire JJ builds in the backyard, making fun of John B and his gaggle of admirers. 

Kiara becomes a regular fixture at the Chateau after that. She comes when JJ asks John B to cancel his fan club, and they steal gnomes from Miss Allen’s garden. She's there when John B has his fan club, and her and JJ do whatever they can to make fun of John B and his admires. She invites both boys to The Wreck, her parent’s restaurant, and she asks her dad for chicken nuggets and french fries and the three of them gorge themselves until JJ literally has to throw up.

It’s a few weeks of Kiara being a constant presence before JJ graces her with a nickname. He’s got a thing for nicknames - he’s just about the only person on the island who calls John B ‘JB’ with any sort of regularity, even though John B is already, technically, a nickname. JJ doesn’t really decide on this nickname - it’s a natural shortening of Kiara, and it just slips out one day on the dock. 

“Hey, pass me the fruit snacks, will you Kie?” JJ says, not really thinking about the name. 

“Kie, huh?” Kiara says, throwing a pack of fruit snacks from her lunch box to JJ’s waiting hands. She had seen, in the last couple of weeks, the shockingly little amount of food or snacks around the Chateau. She hadn’t been to JJ’s house - she won’t step foot in that house for years and years - but she imagined it was much the same way. Her own house was always filled with snacks and food. She had offered to have the boys over her house once, and it had been an increasingly awkward affair. The two boys didn’t fit into her parent’s house on Figure Eight and they were uncomfortable on the shaggy carpet of her bedroom floor. After being so obviously confronted with her wealth, JJ and John B had treated her differently for three days. It was three days of them barely speaking to her, as if it was awkward for them to exist around someone who knew what it was like to have their own bathroom. She had even come upon the boys cleaning the Chateau one afternoon, a rare sight that had her rolling her eyes. As if Kiara cared anything for the cleanliness of the Chateau or the age of the shoes the boys wore. She had just rolled up her sleeves and joined them in sweeping the floors. Even then, they had still treated her differently. In the end, she had to get into the marsh and dig for clams with the boys, up to her elbows in mud, before they started treating her like a human again.

That was a few weeks ago, a blip on their friendship that had long since been forgotten by the boys. Kie, for her part, had told her parents she wanted to pack her own lunches for school in the weeks since. She had decided to fill her lunch box - and her backpack, when she could get away with it - with any snacks she could find. She would hide the snacks in the fridge or the cabinets of the Chateau when the boys weren’t looking, and she always offered the ‘extra snacks from her lunch’ to the boys on the dock. She was pretty sure the boys knew what she was doing - the snacks disappeared everyday, like clockwork. The boys didn’t ask her about it directly, they would just occasionally ask her to pass a snack, or they would swipe grapes from her open lunch box, or they would fight over the bag of chips she tossed at them when she came in the door. She was also pretty sure her parents knew what she was doing, because her mom kept complaining about the amount of fruit snacks she had bought in the last month. Kiara just shrugged and said she had packed a couple everyday for lunch. Her mom had barely accepted the explanation with narrowed eyes.

“Uh, yeah. Your name is Kiara, and Kie is … short for Kiara.” JJ says, ripping into the small bag.

“I’m pretty sure that’s crap. I’ve never heard anyone shorten Kiara to Kie.” John B says, but JJ just shakes his head. 

“You’ve also never met anyone else named Kiara.” JJ says. He turns to look at Kiara, pointing at her. “You are now Kie.” 

It’s like she’s always been Kie.

There's a rhythm to Kie’s visits on Fan Club days - she finds JJ, they do something to piss off either John B, his Fan Club, or both, and then they find a couple snacks and sit back to make fun of whatever ridiculousness they are forced to endure. They continue calling themselves ‘John B’s Pogues’ as a joke, especially because John B hates it.

“I’d never throw you guys back!” John B says, and the two of them burst into laughter again. Kie threatens to make t-shirts for both her and JJ. JJ threatens to make a t-shirt company. _The Pogue Lyfe T-Shirt Company, for all of John B’s Rejects._ JJ and Kie think it’s a million dollar idea. John B thinks it’s the most frustrating exercise in the world. 

Despite the misgivings of _John B’s Rejects_ , JJ, John B, and Kie get on like a house on fire. It becomes increasingly obvious to everyone that not only is Kie completely uninterested in joining the fan club, but also that she’s way, way closer to both JJ and John B than any of the other girls are. It becomes so painfully obvious that some of the girls take to mimicking Kiara to get John B’s attention. One girl even goes as far as imitating JJ and Kiara’s fake drowning scheme by jumping in the water and claiming something bit her. Another girl gets caught trying to steal a gnome from Miss Allen’s yard and her parents call up Big John, yelling about how John B is corrupting their daughter. Big John looks at the three kids piled on his couch, Kiara in the middle of the two boys as they share a family sized bag of cheetos as Mrs. Stevens screams into the phone about _debauchery_ and _deviants_ and _delinquency_. Big John may not be sure of Kiara yet, but she seems like a good fit for the boys. She’s constantly feeding John B fruit snacks, though. It's gonna run up the dentist bill, that's for sure. 

Big John rolls his eyes at the ‘corrupting’ comment, but he tells the mother on the other end of the line that he’ll talk to John B about it. He hangs up the phone and tells the three kids they aren’t allowed to steal gnomes from Miss Allen’s yard anymore because Mrs. Stevens called and said it was corrupting her daughter. The three kids look innocent as they deny ever stealing a gnome, but Big John knows better. He just smiles at the gleam in JJ and Kiara’s eyes and goes back to his study. 

The corruption comment just adds fuel to JJ and Kie’s jokes, and it makes the entire fan club hate Kie even more. 

It all comes to a head one day when JJ and Kie are sitting in Big John’s whaler, watching John B try to teach a girl named Kelly how to bait a hook, and Kelly is adamant she will not touch a worm. It’s completely hilarious to JJ and Kiara, who are working their way through an entire box of Capri Suns and a bag of pretzels as they watch. JJ doesn’t even really remember the joke Kie made - just that he laughed like crazy as she said it. It had been something about Kelly being scared of a worm. Before JJ even realizes what’s going on, Kelly has taken the worm from John B and flung it directly into Kie’s face. Kiara is deadly still for a second, and JJ can’t even register what just happened. 

“If you like worms so much, there you go, you skank!” Kelly yells. It’s pretty lame as far as insults go, but for a fifth grader, it’s cut throat. JJ is still as Kiara pulls the worm off her face and throws it off the side of the boat. In a flash, before he even realizes what he’s doing, he’s on his feet, rocking the boat violently as he makes his way onto the dock, beelining straight for Kelly. She’s not even paying attention to him, because John B is already yelling at her for being “not cool.” It’s not enough for JJ. 

“Kiara’s a skank? Why don’t you look in the mirror?” He says to Kelly, and her head whips around. 

“Stop talking to me, Maybank.” She says, and then she’s turning back to John B, who’s making a step to get in between JJ and Kelly. He knows JJ won’t purposefully hurt Kelly, but he also doesn’t want JJ pushing her into the water. John B’s pretty sure Kelly doesn't know how to swim, which is a cardinal sin on the island. 

“Let’s calm down for a second, JJ.” John B says, and that just makes JJ even angrier. He shouldn’t be protecting Kelly - he should be protecting Kiara. 

“What, she can be a bitch and throw things at Kie but I can’t call her out for it?” There are gasps all around as JJ uses a real life swear word against Kelly, but he doesn’t care. In all honesty, he’s not even sure he’s using it right, but he’s heard his dad and a few of his work buddies use it when they come over for poker night, so he’s fairly confident in his usage. 

“Woah, woah, woah - “ John B says, trying to de-escalate the situation.

“Shut up, JJ, not even your mom wanted you.” Kelly scoffs, and both JJ and John B go silent for a moment. When John B turns around to face Kelly, he makes it clear exactly what he thinks of her. 

“Leave.” John B says, and Kelly starts to argue. “All of you! Everyone! Leave! Now! Get off my dock.” John B yells when no one moves. 

JJ knows John B doesn’t mean him when he says everyone needs to leave, but Kiara isn’t as sure of her place at the Chateau as JJ is. She starts gathering her things at John B’s words, trying to clean up the boat before she leaves. 

“Not you, Kie.” John B says when he sees her gathering her stuff, his voice much harsher than he intends it to be. She visibly recoils at his tone, and he makes an effort to soften his voice. “You can stay if you want.” 

Kiara nods silent and drops her things before stepping out of the boat and approaching the two boys. John B’s looking at JJ again, trying to determine how badly Kelly’s comment affected him. He’s been silent since she uttered the hateful words, staring blankly in front of him. As Kiara stops to stand next to JJ, the boy looks up at John B. 

“Kelly is a bitch.” JJ says. 

“I know.” John B replies, and JJ nods for a second before he bursts into tears. John B isn’t unfamiliar with JJ being emotional, so John B just pulls him in for a hug. Kiara, on the other hand, has seen nothing but funny, mischievous JJ, and is stunned into silence when he starts crying. Eventually, she snaps out of it, and she wraps her arms around the two boys in front of her, trying to hold them all together. Later, she’ll ask John B about JJ’s mom. She’s heard the story, from the newspaper and conversations she’s overheard between her parents, but she still doesn’t know how to make sense of it. John B just shrugs, tells her that JJ’s mom isn’t around and she shouldn’t ask JJ about it. He says JJ will tell her when he’s ready. 

  
The John B Fan Club doesn’t come back to the dock again, but John B’s Pogues become an everyday thing. Eventually, John B argues Kiara and JJ down from ‘John B’s Pogues’ to just ‘The Pogues’. It’s a hard thing to argue Kiara down on anything - she’s got a quick comeback and a counter argument for literally everything. But it’s at his insistence of equality - _how can we all be equal if my name is in the title -_ that Kiara relents, and when Kiara relents, JJ knows it’s hopeless to continue fighting. They rebrand themselves as The Pogues and, suddenly, JJ has two best friends. He can be okay with two best friends


	3. Pope

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! We are back with a much longer chapter :) And it’s Pope’s introduction!! Just so the passage of time makes sense, this takes place about a year and a half-ish after the last chapter. Last chapter was near the beginning of 5th grade, this is almost the end of 6th grade. Also, I may or may not have any clue how 11 year old children function. 
> 
> I ended up editing and changing a huge part of this to make it work better and honestly, hopefully, maybe I succeeded? I don’t know, man. 
> 
> Also, if anyone has any ideas they are willing to share for what the name of the Kook Academy should be, please shoot them my way. I’ve been struggling since I wrote my first pass at this story as to what to name it. I’ve been trying to get away with just calling it the academy, but honestly, that isn’t working. I’m open to any and all suggestions. 
> 
> (P.S. I briefly mention a scholarship in this chapter - it’s not the college scholarship from season 1. It’s going to come up in later chapters, but I just wanted to be clear that I’m talking about a different scholarship)

JJ starts failing science in sixth grade. It’s not like schoolwork has ever been JJ’s forte - he spends more time daydreaming about surfing than he does listening to the teacher. But failing science would mean staying back a year. JJ’s mostly unworried, because he’s skated by disaster before. This isn’t the first time a teacher has threatened to hold him back. He’s fairly certain it won’t be the last time.

He’s also pretty sure the teacher is bluffing. No way would she actually try to keep him in her class another year. He knows she still hasn’t gotten over the incident with the glue bottle - she’ll never subject herself to that for another whole school year. 

Kiara, however, is as panicked about the prospect as JJ is nonchalant. JJ lets it slip that he’s in danger of failing one afternoon when they are all hanging out together. He frames it as a joke - some self-deprecating humor about his lack of intelligence - as he leans against the side of Big John’s old whaler. The previous summer, Big John had finally bought a bigger boat for his Royal Merchant research, and had gifted John B the little whaler as a result. JJ painted “HMS Pogue” on the side of the boat and it became the official chariot of the Pogues. It offered a wealth of freedom and a few near disasters for the friends, and they loved it. Even months later, in early Spring, they take the tiny boat out on the water as often as they can. 

Kiara laughs when JJ makes the joke and tells him that Mrs. Henry won’t fail him. He doesn’t respond to her comment, and Kiara’s laughter dies. 

“Wait, are you serious?” She demands. JJ shrugs but doesn’t meet her eyes. “JJ, are you serious?” 

“It’s no big deal, Kie. I’ll be fine. I almost failed 5th grade, too.” JJ says, removing his hat to run his hand through his hair. 

“No big deal? JJ, this is a huge deal.” She looks at John B, finally, only to find him dutifully ignoring her eyes as well. “You knew?!” She yells at him, and John B looks at her quickly, like he’s shocked she was paying attention to him. 

“Uh, I mean, I didn’t not know.” John B says, and Kiara swipes at his shins with her foot. It’s the only part of his body she can reach from her seat while he’s at the boat’s wheel. He dodges her foot but she clips him just enough to get her point across.

“This is serious, guys! You can’t keep secrets from me. No secrets among Pogues!” Kiara says. Kie’s been making rules up for the Pogues since the godforsaken day she joined - no Pogue left behind, Pogues eat free at the Wreck, no disappearing without telling another Pogue where you are - and No Secrets Among Pogues is just one of them. She’s the only one that enacts her own rules. The boys play by her rules when it benefits them, because keeping Kiara happy is always a good idea, but certain things are left between JJ and John B. 

“You should know I’m a rule breaker, Kie.” JJ says, and Kiara wants to throttle the boy. She knows JJ and John B have been friends since before she even knew them, and it pisses her off when they keep secrets from her. In the early days of their friendship, after the John B Fan Club Phase, she had nearly quit the Pogues because JJ and John B would tell each other everything and leave her in the dark. She had finally put her foot down and told them that there would be no secrets between them or she would leave the Pogues. The boys agreed with her terms, but she still had to remind them, fairly often, not to leave her in the dark. She knew the boys could tell that leaving the Pogues was an empty threat. Maybe John B and JJ had been friends longer, maybe they kept more secrets between the two of them, but no one could deny that the Pogues began with Kiara. Now, she was as integral to the friendship as they were. 

“Not this rule! You have to tell me stuff. I can help you!” She says, and JJ rolls his eyes. It’s not that JJ wants to keep secrets from Kiara - he’s told her all the secrets he’s dared. Anything he thinks she can help with or she won’t freak out over, he’s made sure she knows. Kiara’s his best friend, he would never want to keep her in the dark. But Kiara’s from Figure Eight, and as much as he hates to admit it, there are things that Kiara would never understand. He’s seen Kiara’s house, he’s talked to her parents briefly when he picked her up a few times. There are truths that would shatter Kiara’s view of him, things so devastating he can’t bring himself to admit them outloud. Given the chance, he wouldn’t burden John B with them either, but there’s only so much you can hide when you stumble to John B’s door step in need of an ice pack and a cup of hot chocolate. John B understands more than Kiara ever will, if JJ has any say in it. JJ knows that Kiara thinks he leaves her in the dark because he doesn’t trust her as much as John B. It’s not true - not even a little bit. He knows Kiara’s got his back as much as he has hers, and that given the chance, she’d go to bat for him everytime. But he also knows she won’t really understand, and he doesn’t know how to tell her she’ll never understand. It’ll break her heart. 

“I don’t need your pity help, Kie. I got it covered. Mrs. Henry hates me too much to keep me back.” JJ says, trying to deflect the conversation from the Pogue rules and the secrets he keeps. He’s incredibly successful in his deflection - almost too good. It’s silent for a second as Kie processes the words, and then she jumps up from her seat, rocking the small boat dangerously to one side. 

“ _What?!_ ” She yells, and both boys look at her in shock. “You might _stay back?!”_

JJ just shrugs, trying to appear unconcerned so Kiara will calm down. “That’s what happens. If you fail one of the core classes, they can hold you back.” 

“No. No, no, no, no no.” Kiara says, stomping over to the wheel. She tells John B to move out of the way and shoves him when he doesn’t comply fast enough. 

Kiara’s not a fan of steering boats. She loves water, and swimming, and surfing, and she’s already starting to learn about the mechanics of the engine and the way to fix simple problems. Lord knows she has enough practice fixing the HMS Pogue’s engine issues. But she doesn’t actually like driving the boat - she’d rather let John B or JJ do it, since they love it so much. When Kiara takes over steering, whipping the boat around and cranking the speed up as far as she dares, the boys are shocked. 

“What are you doing?” John B says, and Kiara looks at him sharply. Her mind is frantic, because JJ staying back would be the most disastrous thing she can think of. They won’t move to high school together, they won’t ever be in the same classes. When (if) they graduate High School, it would be in different years. She won’t stand for it - JJ won’t stay back on Kiara’s watch.

“We are going home. To study.” Kiara says, and both boys groan. JJ starts to argue, but Kiara hits him with a hard glare that shuts him up. 

Kiara tries tutoring JJ for two weeks. The only reason it lasts that long is because she is stubborn as hell - she won’t let JJ fail, and she won’t admit she can’t help him. It’s a demanding process, though, and Kiara _hates_ tutoring JJ. JJ is her best friend, one of the people she cares for most in the world. The only reason she’s even trying to tutor him is because she loves him. Normally, she can’t get enough time with JJ. He’s the funniest, most adventurous person she knows. She hates going even a couple days without seeing the kid. While she is constantly picking fights with John B, JJ and Kiara hardly ever fight. They have an easy camaraderie about them, and even when Kiara is annoyed with him, JJ usually manages to wiggle his way out of it without a fight. They may tease each other mercilessly, but they don’t fight. JJ is her best friend.

But, heaven help her, she can’t stand tutoring him. He doesn’t take her, or her threats, seriously. He jokes around when she tries to explain cells to him. He stares off into the distance when she tells him about the Theory of Evolution. When she brings up planets, he pretends he’s fallen asleep. She nearly rips her hair out everytime they sit down to study at the kitchen table in the Chateau. 

John B is absolutely no help. John B’s not a stellar student either, but he’s not quite in danger of staying back. With one stern warning from Kiara, he decides to try and be helpful by sitting with them and studying. After the first screaming match about the differences between Animal and Plant cells, John B learned to stay outside while they attempt to study. 

After two weeks, when JJ comes back to the Chateau with a 37% on his science quiz, Kiara decides she’s going to quit. She needs someone who JJ will take seriously, and it’s clearly not her or John B. She spends a few days thinking about it, and she decides to take a risk. JJ’s going to hate it, but she decides to bring in cavalry in the form of Pope Heyward. 

Kiara’s shocking good at math, and when they divided the sixth grade class into “gifted” and “non-gifted” math classrooms, Kiara ended up in the “gifted” classroom. She was seated next to Pope Heyward, and throughout the school year, he had been okay. He was odd, for sure, and he didn’t have many friends. He was pretty chill, though. He would often whisper the answer to Kiara if the teacher called on her and she didn’t know what to say. And sometimes he whispered jokes under his breath that were so funny, Kiara started crying from trying not to laugh out loud. They had a tentative sort of friendship, despite the fact that Pope still had trouble talking to Kiara because she was a girl. Kiara just tries to ignore his stumbling sentences and awkward pauses. 

Kiara also knows that Pope is one of the best students in their year, particularly in science. He had won both the 5th and 6th grade science fairs, and people were already talking about him getting the Willard T. Bothwell Scholarship. He was ridiculously intelligent, and he had been in all upper level classes since the school started tracking. JJ and John B are aware of him in the sort of way they are aware of all the smart kids - they exist, but on a different plane of existence. 

Kiara may not be sure about Pope, but she knows he can help JJ with science. She also has heard him talking about tutoring with another one of the brainiacs from the Math team in the few minutes before class started. It’s then that the idea starts forming in her head. She struggles with it that night, because getting Pope to tutor JJ would require Kiara telling Pope that JJ’s struggling, which would technically be a betrayal of JJ’s trust. She’s also pretty positive that JJ’s going to hate the entire idea, and he’s probably going to blame her for it. And even if he takes it seriously, it might not help JJ pass. If Kiara gets Pope to help JJ and JJ still doesn’t pass, JJ’s going to be even more insecure in his intelligence and it’s just going to further instill in him the belief that he’s not good enough. Kiara categorically refuses to allow JJ to believe he’s not good enough, but she’s not sure Pope will work to the same end. She’s not sure if Pope will make JJ more insecure. 

She tosses and turns in her bed all night, running scenario after scenario in her head. When she wakes up in the morning, one thing is clear - if something doesn’t change, JJ might stay back. It’s a risk to bring in a non-Pogue to a Pogue predicament, but it might just be worth it. She pulls Pope aside after class the next day to ask him about tutoring. 

“Uh, yeah, I tutor through the library for volunteer hours. But, uh, you seem like you’re doing fine with polynomials. If you need help with homework -” Pope says when Kiara corners him. His eyes are wide and they look anywhere but directly at Kiara. He stumbles over his words, trying to form a coherent sentence.

“No, no, not for me. For my friend.” Kiara says, and Pope finally looks at her. He’s clearly confused, because it’s not exactly everyday someone like _Kiara Carerra_ asks you to tutor one of her friends. Pope’s pretty sure her only really close friends are JJ Maybank and John B Routledge, and he’s certain neither of them would be asking for tutoring. 

“If I pay you, can you help tutor my friend? And not tell him that I’m paying you?” Kiara says. Kiara’s speaking off the cuff - she’s not exactly sure where she’ll get the money, but she’s fairly certain she can sneak a few twenties out of her mom’s wallet without too much of a fuss. Whatever she has to do to keep her Pogues intact, she’ll do it. If Pope needs money to be motivated to help, more power to him. She’ll make it happen. 

“Uh, no, that’s fine. If you go to the library and sign your friend up, it’s free and I get credit for it for a President’s Award.” Pope says, and Kiara thinks for a second. She knows that JJ will not let her drag him to the library, and he won’t want to study in a public place like that. Nevermind all the distractions - it would be impossible to force him to focus. She wants to give Pope a fighting chance to help JJ - meeting at the library would be a definitive loss. 

“Um, I think my friend would not want to meet you at the library.” She says, and Pope looks at her like she’s got three heads. He’s fairly certain he has no idea what she’s talking about - he doesn’t know any friends of Kiara’s that would be willing to sign up for tutoring. Kiara has some loose acquaintances in the upper level classes, but they rarely sign up for tutoring from their peers. Usually, upper level middle school students will work with high school tutors. Kiara’s true friends in the lower level classes are equally as unlikely to sign up for tutoring from Pope - they just couldn’t be bothered. 

“Who is your friend?” He says, because he’s kind of confused and he’s beginning to wonder if this friend even exists. He doesn’t know Kiara’s angle, but he’s starting to think this may be a prank. 

Kiara just sighs. She’s going to have to tell Pope eventually if he’s going to agree, and it’s not like she’s betraying JJ’s trust for no reason. She’s trying to help him. 

It still feels pretty terrible when Pope’s eyes widen as she says “JJ Maybank.”

“Uh, are you sure -” Pope says, and Kiara cuts him off. 

“JJ needs help with science. Can you help him?” She says curtly, because she doesn’t appreciate how Pope reacted to JJ’s name. She knows the Maybanks have a reputation on this island, but she won’t let anyone bad mouth JJ in front of her.

Pope regards her for a minute. Pope’s terrified of a lot of things, and JJ Maybank is one of them. It’s not that JJ’s ever been mean to him - JJ hasn’t ever paid Pope any mind. But Pope has heard stories about him and John B. He knows they steal lawn ornaments from other houses and drive a boat around even though none of them have a license. He’s heard rumors about JJ getting in fights with older kids and kooks. He’s seen JJ come into school with new bruises from said fights. He knows the two boys lie, steal, and cheat. It’s not like Pope’s an angel, but he’s deathly afraid of breaking the rules and getting in trouble. His parents always told him that he needs to have a perfect record. Any infraction on his record is going to cause him ten times the trouble it would cause any of the rich kids on the island. He needs to have good grades and a mile long list of extracurriculars and volunteer opportunities and maybe he’ll be afforded some of the same opportunities the Kook children are handed at birth. It’s unfortunate but it’s true. 

Despite all that, Pope likes Kiara. He _likes_ Kiara, because she’s a pretty girl and he’s an 11 year old boy. But he also gets along with Kiara, which he wasn’t expecting when the teacher sat them next to each other on the first day of school. Honestly, he had been terrified to learn Kiara Carrera was in his class, much less sitting next to him. He knew she was friends with John B and JJ, and he knew they loved to get into trouble. He had never talked to her before, because he imagined she was probably crazy and they wouldn’t get along. But she introduced herself on the first day of class, and she laughed sometimes when he told jokes, and when they had a chance to talk in class, she was always kind to him. She was also super funny, and almost better at math than he was. If Kiara was desperate enough to ask him to help JJ with science, Pope decided he’d be able to take the chance. Who knows, maybe JJ would surprise him as much as Kiara did. 

“I can. If you go to the library, they have a form that can be filled out by his parents to confirm my hours. That way, we can meet anywhere to study.” Pope says after a minute, and Kiara softens slightly. 

“Alright, that should work.” She says, but in her head, she’s already left the conversation. She’s trying to figure out if it’s better to tell JJ about the tutoring before he meets Pope or if she should just surprise him. She knows if she gives him any chance at all, JJ will try to get out of the tutoring. She also knows if she surprises him, JJ will probably explode and it might scare Pope. 

“When do you think we should meet?” Pope says, and Kiara shrugs, still trying to mull over how to break the news to JJ. 

“How about today after school?” Kiara says, and Pope is shocked. He’s used to dealing with mothers and strict schedules, he’s never had a tutoring session that was so unstructured. Normally, he has to schedule tutoring sessions in between the student’s french horn lessons and soccer practice. The casual indifference with which Kiara mentions starting the sessions today throws Pope off. 

“Uh, I mean, usually you schedule these things a little in advance.” Pope says, trailing off at the end. 

“Can you do it?” Kiara asks, and Pope looks at her for a second before nodding. 

“Yeah, yeah. I can do this afternoon.” Pope says, and Kiara thanks him. She starts to turn around and jet off to her next class, when Pope stops her with one last question. “Where should I meet you? Or him?”

Kiara thinks for a second, looking at him over her shoulder as she contemplates the question. “Do you know where John B’s house is?”

Of course Pope knows where John B’s house is. Pope’s dad knows everyone on the island, rich or poor, and the Routledges are no different. Pope’s not quite as well versed as his dad, but he knows where John B lives. 

Pope has been spending the last few years hearing about John B and his supposedly amazing fishing skills from his classmates. He’s heard of JJ’s crazy antics. He knows the three of them - they call themselves the Pogues, as if they are some sort of gang - get into trouble around the island regularly. Pope’s dad always told him to stay away from both John B and JJ. Pope’s dad hasn’t even begun to decipher Kiara.

Pope’s dad would have a heart attack if he saw Pope standing outside the rundown fishing shack that John B calls home. Pope’s ready to have a heart attack himself. Tutoring JJ sounds like the worst thing in the world. Pope decides that he only agreed to this because his brain fries everytime Kiara talks to him.

Pope’s ready for a disaster. 

Kiara meets him on the driveway, a large stack of tutoring forms under her arm. Pope’s eyes widened when he sees the stack - when he agreed, he was fairly certain he was agreeing to help JJ study for an exam or something. A one-time, maybe two-time deal. Pope knows that Kiara is into saving the environment, but he’s pretty sure she single-handedly doomed a small forest with the number of forms she picked up. Pope might end up tutoring JJ well into college. 

“Hey!” She says conversationally. “You found it!”

Pope’s still stunned by the number of forms she picked up, but he nods and squeaks out a “Hi.”

“Come with me, I’ll show you inside!” She says as she walks past him, and he has no choice but to follow. She leads him through the screened in porch and through the front door of the house. The Chateau is a small building - one large room with the kitchen, living room, and dining room, with a few bedrooms and a hallway that leads to the front of the house. The house is cluttered with photos and fishing poles and cereal boxes that just lay around.

Kiara moves from the tiny living room into the kitchen, dropping her book bag by the counter. Pope stays frozen in the doorway as both John B and JJ stare at him from the kitchen table. 

“Hey boys!” Kiara says, setting her stack of papers on the counter. 

“Kiara - “ JJ says in a warning voice, still staring at Pope. Pope can see Kiara roll her eyes. 

“Guys, this is Pope. He’s Heyward’s son.” Kiara says, and she motions for Pope to sit at the table with the boys. Pope wants to do anything but sit with them.

“Um, Kiara?” John B says as he turns in his seat to look at her. She hits John B with a glare so sharp he immediately turns around and greets Pope. “Uh, nice to meet you Pope. Welcome to the Chateau.” John B says, as he gestures around the house. Kiara smiles when John B greets Pope. 

“Chateau?” Pope says as Kiara reaches over the counter to flick JJ’s head. 

“Yeah, that’s what my dad calls this place.” John B says. 

Pope can’t help himself. “But chateau means, like, a french castle.” 

It’s silent for a second before all three of them burst into action. Kiara drops her head to the counter at the same time JJ whips around in his seat to inform Kiara “ _I know exactly what you are up to_ ” and John B says something about “ _well, actually, I am part French_.” 

It’s all a little too much for Pope. “Are you sure this is a good idea?” He says to Kiara over the other two boys.

“Yes!” Kiara says harshly, whipping her head up. She turns to look at JJ, her eyes bordering on wild. Pope gets the feeling that Kiara is exasperated with JJ. “This is a great idea! And it’s going to work!” 

“Kie, you need to chill out. I don’t need another tutor.” JJ says, and Kiara throws her hands up. _Another tutor?_ Pope thinks. _How many had there been?_

“Obviously, I’m not working! Pope needs the volunteer hours and you need the tutoring. So you guys are going to pat each other’s back and sit at the kitchen counter and study!” 

Suddenly, everything makes sense to Pope. Kiara’s insistence on him tutoring JJ, the exasperated look she keeps giving JJ, the near desperate tone in her voice when she says _'it’s going to work_ ’ - Kiara had been tutoring JJ. Kiara looks slightly crazed when she addresses JJ, so Pope has high hopes for his own tutoring session. 

JJ looks like he wants to argue with Kiara, but she just storms out of the Chateau, dragging John B with her and threatening to end JJ’s existence if he doesn’t take this seriously. 

And Pope’s left alone to tutor JJ. 

It doesn’t go horribly. Kiara’s done a pretty good job teaching JJ some study tips, and Pope’s tutors his younger cousin who has ADHD, so he kind of knows how to keep JJ focused. It’s not the easiest tutoring session Pope’s ever suffered, but it’s also not the worst. 

At 4:30, though, JJ says, in no uncertain terms, that he is done studying for the day and Kiara can suck it if she wants him to keep studying. 

“It’s pretty cool that you got friends that’ll do this for you.” Pope says as he’s packing up his school supplies, after JJ made another comment about Kiara being a jerk. He had been making little jabs and comments about Kiara since they started studying, even though she had dutifully stayed outside on the dock with John B the entire time. Pope had ignored the comments most of the time, but he feels like he should defend Kiara a little bit. 

“What? Force me to study for hours on end?” JJ says, scoffing, and Pope shrugs. He’s trying to shove his science text book into his backpack, so he’s not looking at JJ when he speaks.

“No, try and look out for you.” Pope says, and JJ’s quiet for a moment. Pope looks up once he zips his backpack shut to see JJ staring at the table, his hands on the back of the chair he had been sitting in. 

“I don’t need Kiara to look out for me.” He says, the words coming out harsh, but Pope doesn’t flinch. He just swings his backpack over one shoulder, and shrugs again as he looks at JJ.

“It’s still nice to have.” Pope says, before turning and heading towards the door of the Chateau. Something about the way Pope says it makes JJ pause again. He’s been enraged with the entire tutoring scheme since Pope walked through the front door - he had thought Kiara was being ridiculous and a buzzkill. But Pope reminds him that Kiara’s just looking out for him and worrying about him, and he should count his blessings that he has people like that in his life. JJ’s still going to give Kiara a hard time for the tutoring session, but maybe later - much, much later - he’ll tell her he was thankful that she tried so hard. 

Kiara and John B are busy swatting a plastic ball back and forth with two badminton rackets when Pope and JJ exit the Chateau. John B spots them as soon as the door opens and cheers as they move down the steps. 

“Yes! JJ is done! I’ve been wanting to go swimming all afternoon.” John B says, completely missing the ball Kiara volleyed at him. 

“Are you done?” Kiara says, her voice suspicious. She turns to look at the boys, her hand on her hip, and if Pope was in JJ’s position, he would have turned back into the Chateau. Kiara can be scary. 

But JJ just runs at Kiara, throwing her over his shoulder and taking off down the dock. He’s a little unstable, because they are still roughly the same height and he’s not nearly strong enough to carry another human, but he manages to get down the dock with no casualties. 

“No! Stop! I don’t have a bathing suit on!” Kiara yells as JJ approaches the water. 

“Who’s fault is that?” JJ yells as he takes the last steps off the dock, catapulting the two of them into the water. 

John B’s laughing as JJ and Kiara come up sputtering water, Kiara trying to push JJ’s head below water. “I’m just trying to get you to seventh grade!” She yells in between splashes, and JJ retaliates. 

“I’m not going to get to seventh grade if you _drown_ me!” He yells back, and she just splashes him once more in response. 

“Uh, I’m going to get going.” Pope says, and the Pogues turn to look at him. It seems like they had already forgotten he was there, like they were surprised someone who’s not one of their was still standing outside the Chateau.

“You can stay if you want, Pope.” Kiara says as she treads water, and Pope can see JJ kick her underwater. She smiles at him, so he knows she means it, but he also knows she only ⅓ of the Pogues.

“Nah, it’s fine. I have … homework to do, and stuff.” Pope says, and Kiara nods. It’s not exactly a lie, either. He’s got a stack of spanish assignments he needs to get working on.

“Next time?” She says, her smile hopeful. He doesn’t know when next time will be - he doesn’t know how often Kiara expects him to come to the Chateau, but Pope just nods. 

“Maybe next time.”

Next time is the very next day. And the day after that. And the day after that. It becomes clear that Kiara expects Pope to be at the Chateau everyday. It’s also clear that Kiara takes JJ’s education far more seriously than he does. Everyday, JJ and Pope sit at the kitchen table until exactly 4:30, and then JJ basically sprints out of the house and onto his next adventure with his friends. Kiara always asks Pope if he wants to join them. Pope always says he has something to do. 

Sometimes, it is because he has something to do. He has his own studying and homework to do, and sometimes his dad asks him to help with the grocery runs. But most of the time, it’s because John B, JJ, and Kiara are such great friends, Pope feels lonely even when he’s around them. Pope has his friends from the Math team and the Chess club, but he doesn’t have friends like the Pogues. He doesn’t have friends that throw each other off of docks fully clothed, or swim at the Boneyard, or go surfing at dusk. He doesn’t have friends that would force him to sit with a tutor for several hours a day to ensure that they stay in the same grade. It’s unusual for Pope to be surrounded by that type of friendship - he’s not used to it.

Eventually, him and JJ come to some sort of agreement about how they study. JJ can do pretty well with rote memorization, but he hates reading from the textbook. Pope figures out that if he reads the chapter and tells JJ a thorough summary of it, JJ can remember more of it than if JJ reads it himself. He also learns that the more casual he is in explanations - “ _that cell and that cell just kind of stick together and then they don’t unstick_ ” - the better. If he starts using too many terms and definitions, JJ just stops paying attention to him. It’s not that hard, and after a week and half, Pope thinks JJ might actually be getting the hang of it. Pope’s pretty proud of himself for this one - he’s tutored a lot of kids, but JJ’s a pretty solid success story already. 

JJ must also be pretty proud, cause one day, instead of Kiara asking him to stay, JJ does. 

“Why don’t you stay for a little while? John B’s dad is getting pizza and we were going to have a fire out back.” JJ says as Pope starts to clean up his stuff. He’s shoving a large stack of tutoring forms into his backpack. Kiara had handed him the stack of papers, explaining that she strong armed Big John Routledge into singing a whole slew of them and providing his number as a reference on all of them. Pope’s not sure how to drop them off with the librarians without looking guilty, but he’s thankful for the effort Kiara put into it. He’s fairly certain he’s going to be awarded a gold President’s Volunteer Award if the librarians accept all of the forms. 

Pope’s shocked by JJ’s proposal, because even though he and JJ had managed to get along well enough for the last week and a half, he was pretty sure JJ hated him. And the fire sounds dangerous - four kids, a tiny backyard, and a fire? Sounds like a disaster. 

Pope finds himself agreeing anyways. “Uh, yeah. I can stay for pizza. I’ll just… call my dad.” 

JJ nods, and Pope goes to the house phone to dial his dad’s number as JJ leaves the front door of the Chateau, yelling “Pope’s staying for dinner!” at John B and Kiara, who cheer loudly when JJ says it. 

Pope smiles as he dials the number. It’s pretty cool to have a few friends. 

Pope joins them for a few days. Pope’s mostly quiet, except when Kiara directly addresses him, and he’s hesitant to join in on any of JJ’s shenanigans, and one day, after Pope leaves, John B vocalizes his fears that Pope might not be a good fit for the Pogues. Kiara is worried herself, but she doesn’t let it show. When John B and JJ start discussing if it’s even worth it to invite him back, Kiara fixes them with a stern look and tells them they are inviting him back for at least another few days. 

“You gotta give him a chance, boys.” She says.

They listen to Mama Kie, and they invite him back, which is how Pope gets stuck with them the next Saturday. It’s the first weekend he’s spent with the Pogues, and he’s getting pulled right into the worst of it. The day before, JJ had gotten into a fight with one of their classmates named Travis. The teacher broke it up before it could get physical, and after school, Travis dared JJ to meet him at the flagpole at 10:30 the next morning. It’s the type of setup that has Kiara rolling her eyes, John B and JJ shadow boxing, and Pope looking like he’s going to pop a blood vessel. 

It’s an unseasonably cold day on the island, and Kiara is leaning against the flagpole as if she doesn’t actually care what happens when Travis shows up. She’s also fiddling nervously with the friendship bracelets that adorn her arm, specifically the yellow one that matches the bracelet on JJ’s arm. Pope is standing next to her, his hands in his pockets, and every once in a while, he asks Kiara what’s going to happen when Travis shows up. 

Kiara sighs and repeats herself every time. “The two knuckleheads are gonna try to fight, and both of them are going to get hurt and then we’re going to take JJ home and everything will be fine.” It’s a little mantra that Kiara says to keep herself calm, but it does little to placate either her or Pope.

John B and JJ are pacing, an occasional nervous laugh breaking through their hushed tones. It’s 10:28, and Travis appears from around the corner. 

Travis isn’t alone, in much the same way JJ isn’t alone. Even at a young age, these kids know that traveling around the Cut in a pack is beneficial to their health. And it’s not like Travis is mean or unpopular - in fact, Kiara sits next to him in English and they get along fine, and Travis and John B were partners for the science fair last year. Even JJ doesn’t really have a problem with Travis, it’s just the principle of the thing. Honor, or whatever. Travis said some offhanded “yo mama” joke to JJ, and it’s unlike JJ to back down from any physical altercation, much less one that resulted from the mention of his mom. 

Travis is joined by a couple of their classmates - Cassidy Evans, Mark Smith, and another two kids from the year below them. Cassidy is glaring at the back of Travis’s head, but Mark and the other boys are hyping him up. Before Travis makes his way to the flagpole, he looks back at Cassidy, who’s glare only hardens. He sighs loudly, and approaches the pogues. 

“Okay, so, Cass doesn’t want us to fight.” Travis says, and Cassidy crosses her arms and nods once when the Pogues turn to look at her.

“Why’d you come here if you’re too chicken to fight?” JJ says, stepping towards Travis. Travis sighs again, and Cassidy loudly clears her throat. 

“She has… another idea.” Travis says. He says it like he’s regretting the words as they leave his mouth, but Cassidy is tapping her foot behind him. 

“This better be a damn good idea if we’re still sitting here talking.” John B says, standing by JJ’s right shoulder. The two of them have their arms crossed, standing next to each other trying to look intimidating despite the fact that they are skinny sixth grade boys. Kiara rolls her eyes at them. 

“Instead of fighting, she wants us to steal something.” It’s silent for a moment before Travis continues. “Like Capture the Flag, almost. Whoever gets to it first, wins.” 

“What were you thinking of stealing?” JJ says, his curiosity slightly peaked. He’s a little bit of a kleptomaniac, and he rules the gym class games of Capture the Flag, so he’s interested in the prospect. 

“A gnome from Miss Allen’s yard.” Cassidy yells out, and Travis hangs his head. It takes a second, but pretty soon the three pogues are shaking their heads and laughing. 

“We’ve been stealing Miss Allen’s gnomes since fifth grade.” Kiara raises her voice so Travis will be able to hear her from her place a few yards away. “It’s gotta be higher stakes than that.” 

“How about stealing something from a kook house?” John B says, getting caught up in the conversation. “Say, maybe Tanny Hill?” 

Travis, John B, and JJ all nod at each other, but Pope, Cassidy, and Kiara all vocalize their dissent. 

“ _No!”_ Cassidy yells, at the same time Pope says “ _Oh my god..._ ” and Kiara rolls her eyes, yelling “ _Are you stupid?_ ” to her two boys. 

“That might actually be worth it.” Travis says, running his hands through his hair. Travis isn’t big into fighting - he hasn’t really gotten into a fight before. It’s the reason Cassidy is so worried. Mark gets into fights all the time, so she’s used to that, but normally Travis is smart enough to get out of sticky situations. She also knows JJ has gotten into more fights then Travis has, and she doesn’t want Travis getting hurt. She had argued with Travis for four hours the night before to get him to agree to offer a second option to JJ. She had tried to get him to skip the meeting in the first place, but Travis had refused to even consider it. 

“I don’t know, man. We came here to fight.” JJ says, and Cassidy’s a nervous wreck all over again. She thought that JJ might take the bait and try something less violent, but it seems she was wrong. “It still feels like a cop out.” 

Travis shrugs and turns to Cassidy, as if to say _see, I tried_. She wants to stick her tongue out at him. When Travis turns back to JJ, he just responds “Alright, we can still fight.” 

The two boys nod at each other, and Cassidy trains her focus on Kiara. While JJ and John B have clearly stated their position on the fight, Kiara hasn’t said much yet. Cassidy’s last hope is that Kiara can somehow change their minds. She’s seen, with her own eyes, Kiara glare at John B and get him to do her bidding. She hopes Kiara will focus a little bit of that magic on JJ and get him to agree to her idea. When Kiara looks up, Cassidy meets her eyes, the pleading look obvious on Cassidy’s face. Kiara gets why Cassidy is worried - JJ gets in these scuffles all the time, and they still tie Kiara’s stomach in knots. She also knows that Cassidy is begging her to take her side - as if Kiara telling them to steal from Tanny Hill will change anyone’s mind. As the boys start to square up, Kiara decides to try, for Cassidy’s sake. 

“I think you should try the Tanny Hill thing.” She says loud enough to cause the two boys to pause. Everyone except Cassidy is looking at her quizzically. Cassidy is looking at her like she walks on water. “Yeah, everyone always fights on the playground. This Tanny Hill thing is new and maybe it’ll be fun. You could try and steal the Tanny Hill plaque.” 

In fifth grade, everyone at Kildare Middle School took a field trip around the island to look at the old plantation houses, of which Tanny Hill was the largest. Kiara had ranted and raved about the fact that they were visiting Kook houses. She was incensed that they were going around, visiting houses built by _slave owners_ that had been passed down to the trust fund babies she had to deal with on the daily. She hated it, but she had quieted down when she had heard the story of Denmark Tanny, the former slave who owned Tanny Hill. Kiara thought Denmark Tanny’s story was one of the coolest things she had ever heard, and she thought it was one of the great injustices of the world that the house built by a former slave was owned by a rich white family. She remembers seeing the plaque by the front door of the Tanny Hill mansion, designating the house as a part of the Kildare County Historical Society. Maybe there was some small hope for vengeance when she suggested stealing the plaque. A little self-made reparation, if she does say so herself.

Despite her words, Kiara fully expects JJ to ignore her and sock poor Travis. Kiara knows she is his best friend, but she doesn’t think she has enough power to change his mind. He’s stubborn when he wants to be. 

To her absolute shock, JJ does listen to her. “Okay, yeah. Maybe. Do you want to try it?” JJ says, looking at Travis. Travis looks almost as relieved as Cassidy, and he nods silently. 

And that’s all it takes. Kiara and Cassidy have to stay at the flagpole as judges. Whoever brings them the Tanny Hill plaque first wins, and both girls fight being left behind. But there needs to be some judge, and they all decide the two girls are best fit for the job. Kiara yells “ _this is some patriarchal bullshit!_ ” at all the boys as they take off to Figure Eight, and Cassidy yells “ _yeah!_ ” 

Fifteen minutes later, John B, JJ, and Pope are creeping around the gate at Tanny Hill. In all honesty, JJ was completely against leaving Kiara behind. He would have felt much more comfortable if she was standing next to him, rather than Pope. He had told John B as much when they were discussing who was staying behind as judges, but John B reminded JJ that they needed a judge who was fully Pogue - although Pope had been hanging around them for a few days, it wasn’t clear how loyal he was. Kiara would rather die than let down one of the Pogues, so she would do everything she could to help them as a judge. It made sense at the time, but now JJ wanted Kiara to be behind him, scheming and developing a plan and pointing to low spots in the Tanny Hill fence that JJ could climb over. Pope just followed silently behind JJ. 

Pope, to his credit, was going absolutely insane. Everything that he had ever worried about in his life seemed to be coming together to form some terrible sort of disaster that was certainly going to ruin Pope’s life. He knew the Pogues got in fights, stole things, and purposefully tried to anger the kooks. Little did he know that he was going to get sucked into a scheme so ridiculous, he would be part of all three in a matter of minutes. Pope wants to go to college! They don’t let people into college who steal plaques! His dad is going to murder him, his mom is going to disown him, his entire existence up until this point is going to be meaningless -

John B interrupts Pope’s spiral by pointing JJ to a part of the fence that is significantly lower than the rest - somewhere JJ could reasonably climb over and back. Pope tries to calm his breathing, staring up at the sky to try and ease his mind.

“If you go over here, you can run and grab the sign by the front door and be back in less than 2 minutes.” John B says, peering over the fence at Tanny Hill’s front door. JJ nods, and John B’s about to give him a boost over the fence when Pope grabs his arm.

“Wait!” Pope says, and JJ shrugs off his hand. “You can’t go into the yard.” 

“What do you mean I can’t go into the yard? That’s what this entire thing is about, Heyward.” JJ says, looking at Pope in disbelief. 

“No, dude, there are security cameras everywhere, you are going to get caught!” Pope says, pointing up into the trees to show JJ where the little cameras are. Pope can see four from where he’s standing, and he isn’t even looking very hard.

JJ mostly ignores Pope. “I’ll be fine, just stay here and catch it when I throw it over.” JJ says, preparing for John B to launch him over the fence. Pope grabs his arm again. 

“Seriously, dude, this is a bad idea!” Pope says, and JJ’s about ready to tell Pope to bug off when they hear Travis laughing from inside the fence. All three boys look over the fence to see Travis running across the yard from the other direction, headed straight for the plaque. He rips the plaque of the wall - it’s held on by a single nail - and runs back the other way just as JJ tries to launch himself over the fence. JJ doesn’t really have a plan - maybe he can steal the ugly duck statue. JJ’s fast, and even with his head start, it would be hard for Travis to beat JJ back to the flagpole. Maybe Kiara would be able to convince Cassidy that even though Travis got the sign, JJ could still be the winner if he got back to the school first with something from Tanny Hill.

But John B pulls on JJ’s shirt, tugging him back off the fence as the front door to Tanny Hill opens and the Cameron parents emerge.

“Hey!” Mr. Cameron yells at Travis. “You get back here with that!” 

But Travis is already out of the driveway, heading straight back to the school where Kiara and Cassidy were waiting. 

“Shit, we have to get out of here.” John B says. When JJ doesn’t move, John B pulls on his shirt again. “Now!” 

When the boys safely emerge from the woods by Tanny Hill, JJ spins around to face Pope. The look in his eyes is livid, and it scares Pope. He stumbles back a half step when JJ turns on him. 

“What the hell was that?” JJ yells, pointing his finger at Pope. 

“I was trying to keep you out of trouble!” Pope says when he regains his voice, trying to match his tone to JJ’s. 

“If you hadn’t stopped me, I would have gotten to the sign and out of Tanny Hill before Travis. We’d already be back at the school celebrating that I had won. But you stopped me.” JJ says, jabbing his finger at Pope to emphasize his point before spinning around and stalking back to the school. 

“Yeah, cause the Cameron’s are crazy powerful and I don’t want them to get you in trouble!” Pope said, jogging to keep up with JJ as he yells at the back of his head. John B is behind the two of them, trying to calm both of them down. 

“Why don’t you just mind your own business, Pope!” JJ yells at him, whirling around to look him in the eye. “We’d all be better off if you weren’t hanging out with the Pogues!” 

It’s silent for a moment before John B is admonishing JJ and Pope is shaking his head. 

“Whatever, man. I was trying to help you.” Pope says, turning away from the boys. “I’ll see you at school.” 

JJ just scoffs as Pope walks away, before turning towards the school and telling John B to follow him.

Travis beats JJ back to the flagpole by five minutes. Kiara was completely expecting JJ to win this stupid set up - I mean, running fast and stealing stuff? Is there anything JJ does better? She’s seen him creep around the houses on the Cut, darting out from behind trees and parked cars to steal anything he can get his hands on. He’s quick as a shot, a blinding flash of blond hair and tan skin as he grabs whatever sets his mind to and scurries away. It’s a talent if Kiara’s ever seen one. 

Which is why Kiara was confused when Travis got back first. A few minutes after Travis arrives, Kiara’s worried. By the time JJ rounds the corner of the school to approach the flagpole, she’s taken to pacing. JJ looks about as pissed as she’s ever seen him, John B a few steps behind him. 

Cassidy and Kiara make quick work of declaring Travis the champion of the stupid game, and Travis isn’t annoying about it. He just goes about his way with his crew, while the Pogues follow JJ as he storms off. 

“Okay, what the hell happened, bro?” Kiara asks, once they don’t have an audience. “Where’s Pope?”

JJ spins around, throwing his hands up. “You want to know what happened?” He yells and she just nods at him, like, _duh_. 

JJ recants the story to Kiara, John B adding in details that JJ’s too angry or single-minded to include. Kiara just rolls her eyes when he finishes the story.

“He was trying to look out for you.” She says. 

“He was trying to get in my way.” He counters. 

“You’re really this angry about a stupid capture the flag game?” Kiara says, crossing her arms and looking disapprovingly at JJ.

“It’s not just a stupid game, Kiara!” JJ yells, and Kiara rolls her eyes again. 

JJ hates fighting with Kie, so instead of continuing the argument, he just decides to go home. Not the Chateau. Actual home. He figures he’ll give Kiara a few days to come to her senses and he’ll cool off and then, maybe, they’ll go back to normal and they won’t fight about tutoring or capture the flag. 

Neither Kiara nor John B see JJ again until Monday morning, and by the time Kiara spots him in the hallways, the news is already spreading around the school like wildfire. He’s at his locker in between second and third period when Kiara finds him.

“Have you heard?” She asks excitedly, forgoing a greeting. It’s a rare thing for her to go nearly an entire weekend without seeing JJ, but she’s not about to start using pleasantries with the Maybank kid. Maybe he’s still mad at her, but she doesn’t really care. He’ll get over it, because they are the Pogues. 

JJ hits her with a blank look. “Heard what?” He deadpans, and Kiara sighs. Clearly, JJ is still pissed about Saturday. She wants to roll her eyes and tell him to grow up, but she’s got bigger news. 

“About Travis.” She says offhandedly, and this piques JJ’s interest slightly. He looks at her from the corner of his eye, takes in the way she’s kind of smirking, leaning against the lockers and fiddling with the cover on her textbook. He can tell she’s up to something, but he doesn’t know what. And frankly, he doesn’t care. She pissed him off. 

“No, has he been bragging?” JJ says as he closes his locker, turning away from her to walk down the hallway. Kiara’s quick to launch herself from her resting place on the lockers, hopping a few steps to fall into stride next to JJ.

“No.” She says simply, her voice light. “He has after school detention for two months.” 

JJ finally lets some shock appear on his face. It’s not the biggest news in the world, but it’s pretty damning. After school detention for two months is a huge thing in middle school.

“What’d he do?” JJ says, trying to sound nonchalant. He doesn’t want Kiara to know he’s interested - she may withhold information if she senses he’s too interested. She’ll refuse to tell him whatever she knows until he forgives her, and JJ’s not ready to deal with that. He’s also fairly certain Kiara already knows the angle he’s playing, and she’s going to tell him what she wants him to know when she wants him to know it. He’s used to it - it’s a side effect of being friends with someone so cunning and sometimes devious. 

“He got called down to the office during first period. The Camerons found out it was him who stole the plaque. They saw it _on their security cameras_.” Kiara pauses for dramatic effect, laughs outrightly when JJ stops dead in his tracks. Suddenly, Kiara’s smirk makes sense. She’s gloating because Pope was right, and Pope saved him from two months of detention. 

“You’re kidding.” He says finally, when he doesn’t know what to say. Her smile is practically glowing with “ _I told you so_ ” energy. 

“Nope! I’d say you actually won that challenge.” She says, and John B appears behind JJ at that same second, coming up behind from the side not occupied by Kie. He lifts an arm around JJ’s shoulder, shaking him a little bit.

“Are you guys talking about Travis and the Camerons?” John B says, and Kiara confirms that they were. JJ’s still too shocked to respond. “Crazy how Pope totally called it.” 

JJ drags his feet, looking between his two friends. The two of them continue walking at the same pace, leaving JJ a few steps behind. “Are you guys gonna make me apologize?” 

Both Kiara and John B stop, turning slightly to face JJ in the middle of the crowded hallway. Kiara shakes her head disapprovingly at him, but her smile doesn’t diminish. John B shrugs his shoulders.

“Hell yeah, man. He deserves it. I convinced him to come to the Chateau after school.” John B says, his smirk only growing. Both John B and Kiara walk the rest of the few steps to the history class they all share. JJ’s still planted in the middle of the hallway, wondering when he became friends with such smug assholes. 

By the time school is over, JJ’s changed his tune. Everyone in their grade is talking about how Travis got caught, and everyone who knows the whole story is congratulating JJ on evading detection. He even had a group of eighth graders stop him in the hallway to ask him how he knew the security cameras were there. Unfortunately, Kiara was standing beside him, and he’s already in hot water with her for the whole ordeal, so he just smiled and said a friend helped him. 

“Friend?” Kiara asks when they walk away, and JJ sighs deeply. 

“What the hell do you want me to say? It’s not exactly an easy situation to explain to someone.” JJ says, trying to brush off the fact that maybe he’s beginning to think Pope’s not that bad. He definitely does not want Kiara to catch on. 

He thinks she might already know. 

Despite Kiara trying her best to ruin JJ’s mood, his spirit is significantly lifted by the time school ends. JJ strolls into John B’s backyard more than happy to apologize to Pope. Pope accidentally gained JJ more street cred in one day than JJ had amassed in his entire life. 

“My man Pope!” JJ says as he sees Pope looking super tense sitting on the dock. “Man, I was all wrong about you. I’m sorry for what I said on Saturday, dude. You saved me from two months of detention and I’m super thankful.” 

Pope looks up at JJ from his place on the dock and nods at JJ. Clearly, the kid is not buying JJ’s apology. “It’s no problem. I get it.” His words are stilted, his trust for JJ all but destroyed. JJ gets it, because he was mean on Saturday, but he has a strong feeling Pope’s gonna be around alot for him to make up for it. 

“Nah, man. That was a certified Pogue style move. You saved me from the Kooks. I gotta give you credit.”

Pope softens at the insinuation that he did something Pogue worthy, at least in one way or another. He gets why JJ was pissed off, and he’s happy that JJ’s able to apologize. When JJ tosses Pope a Capri Sun, Pope smiles at him.

“Thanks, man.” He says.

A week later, Pope, Kiara, and John B are sitting around the kitchen table when JJ comes into the Chateau, holding his science quiz over his head. 

“We got a hundo, kids!” He says, pointing to the big 100% at the top of the paper, next to Mrs. Henry’s handwriting with “ _Great Work!_ ” underlined three times. Honestly, Mrs. Henry was so impressed by JJ’s work on the quiz, she almost accused him of cheating. But then one of the librarians had called and said that one Pope Heyward had spent 30 hours in the last month tutoring a kid named John James Maybank, and everything made sense. She was ecstatic to see the Maybank kid putting in some effort. 

Kiara and John B burst into cheers when they see JJ’s score, and JJ pulls Pope into a hug. 

“Thanks, man.” JJ says when he lets go of Pope, and Pope shrugs. 

“Couldn’t have you staying back.” Pope says in response, and then Kiara pushes past Pope to hug JJ. 

“Kiara would have killed you if you let me fail.” JJ says to Pope over her shoulder. 

“Yeah, probably.” Pope says, and John B claps him on the back. 

“Alright, Pogues, this calls for a celebration. What should we do?” John B says, and JJ and Kiara start shouting out different answers as they make their way to the door. 

“Ice cream at the Wreck!”

“Surfing!” 

“We could go to Rixton’s Cove!”

“Or the Boneyard!”

But Pope’s still stuck on the fact that John B called him a Pogue. 

In the weeks after the disastrous Tanny Hill Challenge, Pope becomes as much a part of the Pogues as any of the rest of them. He’s no longer shocked when they call him a Pogue, and it becomes commonplace for the four of them to walk down the hallway in a line, taking up the entire corridor and pissing everyone else off. He finds that John B is charismatic and charming, if a little bit clueless. Kiara is a wealth of comebacks and retorts, and her favorite thing to do is to say something ridiculous and then argue with Pope until he has to agree with her. She’s shockingly good at it, and Pope’s the only one who bothers arguing with her. The other two boys just shrug when she says something like “single use plastic should be illegal” or “football players should donate their entire salaries to homeless shelters” and nod along while she lists her sources. Pope actively engages in the debate, and Kiara lives for it. Kiara wants to win the Kildare County Middle School Debate Tournament, and Pope is a great practice opponent. Pope is shocked by how well he gets along with JJ - after Tanny Hill, they have a sort of banter that often leaves JJ making fun of Pope, but it’s never ill intentioned. Pope likes bantering with JJ almost as much as he likes debating with Kiara, even if JJ rips on him for three weeks when he finds out Pope is the president of the chess club.

The three of them roll their eyes when Pope discusses dead bodies, and he starts sweating profusely whenever they drag him into disastrous adventures. He balances out the impulsiveness of the other three Pogues, and he’s willing to fight with any of them to stop them from doing something incredibly stupid. Slowly, the other three wear him down, and he starts partaking in some mischief with them - albeit, very reluctantly at first. He’ll still over analyze every situation, and he overthinks everything, but he’s always trying to get the four of them out of trouble. It’s a nice balance to the Pogues. With Pope, the Pogues aren’t just a string of bad ideas - they are a little family, looking out for each and drumming up mischief whenever they can.

And it’s always Kie & Pope & John B & JJ. 

  
  



	4. The Golden Years

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so there’s a lot going on in this chapter. Basically, I just wanted to get some friendship development from 6-8th grade for the pogues because I feel like there needed to be some development before we get into the drama of high school. I’m not super happy with this chapter, but I wanted to set up certain things that are going to be important later so I couldn’t just cut it out. 
> 
> And, yes, I did make Kiara’s love language gift-giving, and yes, that’s because my love language is gift giving. Did I also make Moana Kiara’s favorite Disney princess because she is Madison Bailey’s favorite Disney princess? Yes, yes I did. Please don’t call me out on it.

Middle school feels like the golden years of the Pogues. There aren’t any real responsibilities - Kiara’s the first one to get a real job, and she doesn’t start working until she’s a freshman in high school - and there’s no real drama between the four of them. Sure, they fight - silly arguments over the last slice of pizza, blow out arguments about who had dibs on asking Alyssa Ramsey to the dance. Most arguments are resolved in a day or two, if not hours (the argument about Alyssa Ramsey is resolved in a day, when Kiara tells the Pogues she will not be friends with boys who participate in something as sexist as dibs). 

The Pogues take up the tradition of walking from school to the Chateau everyday after the last bell rings. Each of them has to get a note from their parents with explicit permission to walk home from school everyday. It takes nothing to convince Big John to write the note - first he writes John B’s, and then he forges JJ’s. He knows enough about the Maybank family to know that Luke will never know nor care that he forged the letter - JJ’s at the Chateau more than his own home, and Luke hasn’t so much as called Big John since Rose disappeared. 

Pope asks his mom for the note when his dad isn't around, and she’s more than happy to comply. Heyward’s not a big fan of John B and JJ, but Pope’s mom thinks the Pogues are the best thing that ever happened to Pope. And Heyward doesn’t actually care if Pope goes home on the bus or walks to John B’s house after school, as long as Pope’s around for the weekend grocery run. 

Kiara has to beg her parents for three days before they write her a note. She has to promise to take on more chores at home and agree to a curfew in exchange for the note, but she brings it to school the morning after her parents sign it grinning like a maniac. 

They meet everyday after the last bell by JJ’s locker, which is the closest to the front door of the school. It becomes a common sight to see the four kids strolling down the road to the Chateau, laden down by backpacks and textbooks and joking around. John B and JJ will try to push each other into traffic, Pope will try to stop them. Kiara will threaten to throw the three of them off the bridge they cross on their way home, and only John B will be brave enough to call her bluff. Sometimes they take the long way home, stopping by the Wreck for ice cream or hot cocoa, whichever the weather calls for. Sometimes they don’t even stop at the Chateau - sometimes they walk straight from school to Rixton’s cove or the Boneyard. Sometimes, after particularly long days, they get to the Chateau, pull out the couch, and put on a movie. On days like that, Big John typically comes home to see the four of them piled on top of each other, all of them asleep. 

Pope tutors John B and JJ every Wednesday, trying to keep their grades up. After the disastrous semester that forced Pope into the Pogues, Pope decides to take preventative measures. JJ and John B fight him, but he is adamant that he will not play catch up with them if they start failing. Besides, he argues them down by promising they’ll only study one day a week, and Pope won’t worry about subjects he knows they can pass on their own. Kiara tries to help Pope during the first official Wednesday Tutoring Session of the school year, hovering around the kitchen table and offering advice until Pope tells her to leave the Chateau so they can work. She’s pissed off, sitting alone outside, until 4:30, when all three boys emerge from the house and tell her she’s no longer allowed inside during tutoring sessions. Kiara gets angrier, and she doesn’t meet the boys at JJ’s locker the next day. They walk home, just the three of them, and it feels weird without Kiara. John B says they have to apologize to Kiara - Pope says she needs to understand that when he tutors, he has boundaries. JJ ignores both of them and calls Kiara that night to tell her that she shouldn’t take it personally that they don’t want her to tutor them. 

“You’re too good of a friend to be a good tutor.” JJ says, and Kiara huffs. She was helping her mom with dishes when her phone rang with JJ’s ringtone, and she rushed to her room to answer it despite the fact that she was still pissed at JJ. 

“That doesn’t make sense.” Kiara says, sitting on the edge of her bed and fiddling with the friendship bracelets on her wrist. “Pope can be your best friend and tutor.”

“You were our friend first - you can’t become our tutor now. Pope was our tutor first, and then he became our friend. It’s different.” JJ explains, and Kiara flops backwards on her bed. 

“JJ, that’s stupid.” She says, and JJ laughs. 

“I don’t make the rules, I just follow them.” JJ says, and she can picture the teasing look on his face. “Don’t be such a butt about tutoring, Kie. You hated tutoring me.” 

“I did not hate tutoring you!” Kiara lies through her teeth.

“You hated tutoring me.” JJ says again. “I got a 37% on the first quiz you tutored me for. I’m pretty sure I could have done better if I had taken the quiz in a different language.”

“That is so rude!” Kiara yells. “I’m a good tutor!”

“You are a good friend, Kie. The best friend. You are also a crappy tutor.” JJ says, laughing, and Kiara tries not to laugh.

“I hate you.” She says, but the malice of her words is drowned out by the fact that she breaks out into laughter before she finishes the sentence. 

“No you don’t.” JJ says. 

Kiara meets them by JJ’s locker after school the next day. Pope and John B look at each other, kind of confused, but JJ just slings his arm around Kiara’s shoulders as they leave the school. Kiara’s over the fight - she’s decided she’ll take the bus home on Wednesdays, that way she can catch up on her chores and her own homework and she can spend the rest of the week with the Pogues. She doesn’t want to tutor John B or JJ anyways, and she decides Pope is a saint for trying to help the two dopes. JJ was right - the few weeks she spent as JJ’s tutor was the most strained period of the Pogue’s friendship since she joined them in 5th grade. She’s not looking for a repeat. 

\-----------

Kiara’s always making the Pogues friendship bracelets - she had been since she made JJ his first one in fifth grade. The first one is a yellow nightmare - an unskilled knot of mistakes and loose thread, but JJ won’t take it off for all the world. She gradually gets better, trying out patterns and designs that she finds on pinterest. She makes the boys bracelets for big events - birthdays, the end of summer, or the time John B nailed a backflip off the Pogue. She also makes them for seemingly no reason at all - JJ’s particularly quiet one day in August, and she brings him a new bracelet the next day. Pope mentions he likes a specific shade of green, and Kiara buys a spool of embroidery floss in the color closest to his description as soon as she can. Less than a week later, Pope is wearing a new friendship bracelet. 

John B and JJ get Kiara a ukulele for her 13th birthday. Really, Big John is the one who gets it for her - he finds it in one of the second hand stores he frequents for clothes, and he can’t leave it there. Kiara has spent the last few months talking about wanting to learn an instrument, but she doesn’t bring it up to her parents. Her mom wants her to learn to play the flute, and even signed her up for lessons at the end of fifth grade. It took Kiara three lessons and one horrible rendition of ‘Hot Cross Buns’ to realize flute was not her forte. Big John knows Kiara would rather learn to play guitar, but he figures a ukulele is close enough. In Big John’s eyes, a ukulele is just a small guitar. How different can they really be? He picks it up off the shelf without a second thought. 

When he brings it to John B and JJ, they immediately try (and fail) to wrap it for Kiara. On her birthday, Kiara’s presented with an absolute disaster of wrapping paper and a new ukulele. She loves it, hugs the boys and Big John extra tight and sits down to learn to play a few simple songs. She scrolls through her phone, strums a couple chords, and tries to form a melody. She gets pretty good in a matter of weeks - she can play a few songs by memory, and she can google the chords to almost any other song she wants. What musicality she lacked when handed a flute she seems to have in abundance with the ukulele. 

When long days on the boat turn to late nights by the fire, the boys will ask Kiara to play them a song. They don’t particularly care which song she plays, though JJ typically requests any song by the Beatles. John B dares her to sing one night, and Kiara refuses. John B teases her about being scared to sing until JJ starts screaming the lyrics to ‘Here Comes the Sun’ as loud as he possibly can. Kiara tries to strum the chords to the song through her laughter, but JJ lacks any sense of tempo or key. The boys don’t ask her to sing again for a very long time. 

\-----------

The first time Kiara spends the night at the Chateau, she can’t seem to sleep. She wakes up every hour, because of the wind or the rain or the squeaking of the old pull out couch one of the boys is rolling over on. She tosses and turns, throws off the covers and tugs them back around her. The room is too hot or too cold and the sheets smell overwhelmingly of John B and the Chateau. The posters on the wall look demonic in the dark, the action figures on his bookshelf seem to have eyes that follow her. She desperately wants to go outside, to wake up one of the boys so they’ll come in here and make sure the windows are locked and the posters aren’t possessed, but she knows the rules. 

After years of friendship, Kiara was finally allowed to stay over the Chateau. She had begged for years to join John B and JJ during their sleepovers. Her parents had said absolutely not - their daughter was not staying over a house with two boys and a father they didn’t know. She cried and she ranted and she argued, but her parents didn’t budge. Eventually, she resigned herself to it. She knew JJ stayed at the Chateau almost as much as he was home. She also knew JJ’s father wasn’t like her parents, or even like Big John. She didn’t know the extent of it at the time, but she could sense enough turmoil to understand that JJ stayed over the Chateau both because he wanted to and because he needed to. After a while, she stopped arguing with her parents. She figured her parents had the same rules as most parents, and JJ was allowed to sleepover because of an absence of rules. Or, at least, that’s what her parents had explained to her. 

When Pope joined the Pogues, she assumed he would have the same rules. Pope’s parents were as strict as hers are, she thought. Her parents told her that any other parent would make the same decision they were making. 

Her parents were clearly wrong. The first time she watches Pope, JJ, and John B head back into the Chateau from the rearview mirror of her mom’s car, Kiara doesn’t talk to her parents for two days. 

She hates hearing about the movies they watch late at night while she’s in her bed at home, or the early morning pancakes Big John sometimes scrounges up when he’s in a particularly good mood. She hates hearing second hand accounts of late night adventures, stargazing that goes so late into the night it becomes morning, or the way JJ kicks Pope off the pull out couch in his sleep.

Her parents only relented because one stormy night, the bridge between Figure Eight and the Cut unexpectedly flooded. The rain storm wasn’t even particularly bad - they had hurricanes far, far worse than a silly rainstorm, but the high tide and the rain combined to make the road undrivable in a matter of hours. Kiara’s parents were stuck on Figure Eight, and Kiara on the Cut. They called her and told her they can’t come and pick her up because of the roads, and Kiara did a little dance. Her parents asked her to hand the phone to Big John, and Kiara was more than happy to comply. 

Big John formally met Kiara’s parents before at some school function or another, but he knew both of her parents long before he knew Kiara. He was a few years above Mike Carrera in school, and although they weren't friends, they had mutual acquaintances. He knew Anna Quinlen as just another Kook from his days working at the Island Inn Resort. She was beautiful and popular and he was pretty sure she won Prom Queen when she was a senior in High School. He didn’t expect to see her again when she left for college, as he never saw many of the Kook kids again, save for the occasional summer vacation to see their parents. He was surprised when he saw her a few years out of college - just as beautiful, but married to Mike Carrera from the Cut and bussing tables at their new restaurant. Big John doesn’t know how that happened - he didn’t even know Mike and Anna knew each other. He just knows that after the wedding, Anna’s parents didn’t talk to her until Kiara was born. 

When he takes the phone from the smiling little girl, he tries not to visibly grimace. Anna Carrera has told him before exactly what she thinks of his boys and their influence on her daughter - he also knows Kiara never would have been allowed to stay over unless a literal natural disaster made it necessary. He’s not looking forward to this conversation. 

“Hello?” He says, turning away from the living room as Kiara runs to the couch and launches herself across the three boys, cheering because she gets to stay over. 

“Big John, it’s Anna. Kiara’s mom.” Anna clarifies, and Big John tries not to visibly roll his eyes. Who else could it possibly be?

“Hi, Anna.” Big John says, and Anna sighs. 

“I’m not sure if you heard, but the bridge has been flooded.” Big John always gets the sense that Anna Carrera doesn’t think he can tell up from down - there was a flood warning released over an hour ago. He’s pretty there is not a soul on this island that doesn’t know what’s going on. 

“Is that so, Mrs. Carrera?” He says to her, just to piss her off. She always tells him to call her Anna, and he always ‘forgets’. Maybe he shouldn’t antagonize the mother of John B’s best friend, but damn if it isn’t fun. 

Anna scoffs a little bit, but responds quickly anyways. “Yes, well, with all the rain and the high tide, it’s impossible to drive. Mike and I won’t be able to pick up Kiara.”

“That’s a shame.” Big John says. He has learned, in the limited interactions he had with Anna Carrera, to never show your full hand and say as few words as possible. He’s already decided Kiara was staying over, he was under no impression that she was going home, but he’s not going to tell Anna that. 

“You wouldn’t be able to bring her home, would you?” Anna says, and Big John is stunned into silence for a second. He had expected Anna to have a lot to say, but he can honestly say that question surprised him. If the bridge, the only way to get from the Cut to Figure Eight, was closed, how in the hell would Big John get Kiara home? Swim her home? Jesus Christ, for all their college degrees, some Kooks sure are dense.

“That would be a negative, Mrs. Carrera. If the bridge is closed, I won’t be able to make it to Figure Eight.” Big John says, and Anna whispers something about a ‘ _goddamn boat_ ’ under her breath. Big John’s almost ready to ask her what she wants him to do with his _goddamn boat_. Take Kiara home, via his _goddamn boat_ , in the middle of a storm with weather rough enough to flood the road? Because, as far as Big John can tell, that’s a fantastically bad idea. 

Instead, he steadies his breath and reminds himself that Anna Carrera does best with fewer words. Fighting with her now would only make Kiara’s life more difficult. 

“Alright, well, do you know anyone who would be willing to let Kiara stay the night until the flood recedes?” Anna says, and Big John is certain she has to be joking. I mean, Anna can’t be serious. He’s shocked by the question - where else would Kiara stay? Kiara is John B’s best friend - there’s no way Big John is sending her to any other house tonight, especially on a night so dark and stormy. He’s certain that even Anna can’t be that shortsighted. But Anna doesn’t laugh, or brush it off - the line is just silent for a second before Anna calls his name. “John? Are you there?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m still here.” He says, trying to wrap his head around the conversation. His head is spinning. “Um, Kiara’s more than free to stay the night here.”

Anna sighs as if that’s the last thing she wanted to hear. “You know how I feel about Kiara staying over a house with all males.” Anna reminds him, and boy, does Big John remember. Big John gets it, he really does. You gotta do whatever you can to protect your kids - some parents just manifest that protection in different ways. He also knows that Anna grew up as a debutante on Figure Eight, and she has a clear view of what it means to live on the Cut, and she’s been fed the same narrative since she was born. The fact that she married Mike doesn’t seem to soften her to the other members of her husband’s community. She still thinks as lowly of them as she did when she was 16. 

“Yes, Mrs. Carrera, I understand your concerns. But Kiara will be safe here, I promise.” He says, and Anna sighs. He hears something on the other end of the phone that sounds like Mike’s muffled voice, and Anna hums before addressing Big John again. 

“Okay, John, I have some rules.” 

By the time Big John gets off the phone with Anna, he desperately wants a beer. Normally, he’d just grab one, but that’s against Anna’s rules. He can’t drink, Kiara can’t stay up too late, Kiara’s not allowed to leave the house or even go outside, Kiara can’t be in the same room as the boys after 10:00, and Kiara has to sleep in a room with a door that locks. When Big John returns the phone to Kiara, he pinches the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger. He goes to tell John B that Kiara will be staying in his room for the night, and the three boys will have to share the pull out couch. 

Anna tells Kiara that she’s going to lock herself in John B’s room after 10:00 and then not leave the room until 7:00 the next morning. Kiara has to text her as soon as she’s up, answer her calls whenever she’s awake. If Kiara leaves the house, or if the boys give her a hard time, or if Big John starts drinking, he has to tell her mom _immediately_. Kiara yeses her mom through all of the rules. She doesn’t care about the restrictions, she is just excited about getting to stay at the Chateau. When she hangs up with her mom, she turns back to the boys and jumps up and down.

“I get to stay over!” She says, and the boys cheer.

It’s great - she plays board games with the boys and eats out of a tub of ice cream with a spoon. They sit on the floor of the living room, sprawled around the coffee table, trading jabs and insults and jokes until her stomach hurts from laughing. She’s having the time of her life until 10:05, when Big John comes into the living room and tells Kiara she has to go to bed. Kiara gives him her best pleading eyes, asking for five more minutes, and Big John just shakes his head. 

“If we break your mom’s rules tonight, she’ll never let you stay over again. If you follow all the rules, then maybe you can stay over again.” Big John says, and that kicks Kiara’s butt into gear. She’s up and running to John B’s bedroom as fast as her legs can take her. She’s not gonna run the risk of messing up her newfound freedom - she has _finally_ gained the ability to stay over the Chateau. She’s going to do everything in her power to continue to do so. She slams the door to John B’s room shut and Big John hears the lock click. 

None of the boys have moved from their spot on the living room floor. John B and Pope are still leaning towards the table, each holding a handful of cards from the unfinished game of Spoons. JJ grabs one of the spoons in the center of the table quickly and like a knee jerk reaction, the two other boys follow suit.

“Kie lost.” JJ said, using his newly acquired spoon to dig into the ice cream container Kiara left sitting next to him. 

“I’m pretty sure you cheated, JJ.” Pope says, beginning an argument with JJ about whether or not he had a set of four of a kind. JJ argues that it doesn’t matter, because Kiara couldn’t have gotten a spoon anyways, so she was going to lose anyway.

“Why is Kie’s mom so weird?” John B asks over the sound of JJ and Pope’s fight, looking up at Big John. John B doesn’t care about the prospect of losing his room - he’s happy to sleep on the couch if it means Kie can stay over, and even without Kie, he’s more likely than not going to end up sleeping in the living room anyways. It’s just weird to him that Kie has to follow all these rules when the rest of them don’t need to. Big John looks at John B and sighs, walking a few steps to stand next to where JJ sits. 

“She just worries about Kiara. You know, we all gotta look out for each other.” Big John says, and he ruffles JJ’s hair. “You don’t got an ace of hearts, kid.” Big John says as he looks at JJ’s hand of cards. JJ swats at Big John’s hand, complaining that Big John sold him out, but Big John just shakes his head and turns to walk back to his room. He’s about to close his door when he turns to look back to the boys, who have already moved on and started another game. They aren’t quiet in anything they do, but particularly tonight, locked in the living room during a rainstorm, their voices seem to fill up the entire Chateau. Normally, Big John doesn’t give the boys trouble for being loud - he sleeps like the dead, and can fall asleep in the middle of a tornado if given the chance. But he knows Kiara can hear them from inside John B’s room.

“Hey boys?” He says, and the three of them turn to look at him. “Don’t make this anymore difficult for Kiara, okay? She can’t come outside and play with you. Don’t make it sound like she’s missing out.” 

All three boys nod at him and JJ turns to look at John B’s locked door. Big John just smiles at them, tells them goodnight, and shuts his door. He’s not going to give the boys too much of a hard time, but he thinks they’ll heed his warning. Despite what Anna Carrera may say, the boys are good kids and even better friends to Kiara. If he had any money worth betting, he would bet the boys don’t make a peep the rest of the night.

Big John would have won his bet if he had made it - the boys clean up, and it’s a few minutes of whispered yelling, slamming refrigerator doors, and the creaking of the pull out couch as the boys decide to make their bed. They are all laying down, ready to go to bed before 10:30. They try to make as little noise as possible.

Despite all the boys precautions, Kiara doesn’t sleep. At 7:01 the next morning, Big John is in the kitchen when the door to John B’s bedroom cracks open. He sees Kiara’s head pop out, sees her shoulders sag when the three boys are still passed out on the pull out couch. Pope’s curled up in the far corner, John B’s laying straight across the foot of the bed, and JJ’s star fished across all the rest of the available real estate. It’d be a comedic sight if Kiara wasn’t so sad that they weren’t awake.

She notices Big John’s awake after she looks away from her boys, and she scampers out of the room to meet him in the kitchen when he smiles at her. She looks at the bowls and flour on the counter with wide eyes. 

“Do you need help?” She asks, and Big John nods.

“Of course. I always need someone to help with pancakes.” He starts listing off supplies that he needs - milk, chocolate chips, strawberries - and Kiara bounces around the kitchen, trying to find whatever Big John needs as he says it. They both try to stay quiet, because Pope and John B can sleep through anything, but JJ’s up at even the slightest commotion. 

“Did you text your mom?” Big John as she hands him a box of strawberries he paid way too much for at the grocery store. Kiara’s wide-eyed look tells him she didn’t, and he nods at John B’s room. “You should go do that.” 

Kiara scampers back to John B’s room, and a minute later, Big John hears Kiara’s phone ring, presumably from her mother. It’s just enough to wake JJ, who looks up suddenly from his place on the pull out couch. As Kiara begins talking to her mom, JJ untangles himself from the sheets and approaches Big John in the kitchen. Big John’s pouring a glass of orange juice for JJ before the kid even says anything. 

JJ gratefully accepts his orange juice as Kiara leaves John B’s room again. She’s a little shocked to see JJ up, but she hands her phone to Big John. 

“Mom wants to talk to you.” 

_Dear God, not again_ , Big John wants to say. Instead, he just accepts the phone and walks down the hall to his study, warning the kids not to touch anything. 

“Hello?” Big John says when he reaches the door of his study.

“Big John, it’s Anna. Kiara’s mom.” Anna says, as if Big John’s memory shit the bed in the last 12 hours. 

“Hi, Anna.” Big John says, letting some of his irritation slip into his words. 

“I just wanted to thank you for letting Kiara stay over. She said she followed all my rules, and that you made her go to bed at 10:00.” Anna says, and Big John wants to roll his eyes. 

“Yeah, of course. I’m making her breakfast, and once the road is cleared, I can drive her over to the Wreck.” If Big John learned anything from working summers at the Island Inn Resort in high school, it’s that a Sunday morning on the island in the middle of summer means the Wreck would be absolutely overflowing with Brunch guests. He knows that no amount of rain or divine intervention would get in the way of high society women and their early morning mimosas. The Carreras won’t be able to spare the 15 minutes it takes to get Kiara.

Anna sighs on the other side of the phone. “Actually, that would be perfect. You know, with the Wreck…” 

“Of course, Anna. I get it. Sunday Brunch crowd.” Big John says. Sometimes he wonders if she remembers him from back then - she had been a constant member of the golf club, sitting by the pool with her friends or ordering daiquiris when the bartender was too lazy or intimidated to card her. Big John had worked there often enough to know the Kook’s names, their orders, their temperaments. He can remember all of them - their faces, their families, the specific or nonspecific times they made his life a living hell. If Anna Quinlen Carrera remembers the time she almost got him fired because he spilled her iced tea all over the table, she doesn’t show it.

“Sunday Brunch crowd.” Anna Carrera repeats, her voice almost relieved, and Big John is ready to end the conversation and move on. “You know, John, I just wanted to say thank you. For taking care of Kiara. I know I may sound a little crazy, but I just … “ Anna trails off. 

“I get it, Anna.” Big John says, leaning against the door jam. “I’m a parent, too. I know how much I worry about John B, I know how much you must worry about Kiara. I know you gotta do what you gotta do to keep them safe.” 

“I’m glad you understand.” Anna says, and Big John can almost hear a smile in her voice. “When you drop Kiara off, bring the boys with you. Mike and I can treat all of you to lunch.” 

“Ah, Anna, don’t worry about it.” Big John says. 

“I insist.” Anna says, and Big John decides _what the hell_. If Anna Carrera is gonna pay to feed him and the boys, he’s not going to fight her on it. 

“Alright, Mrs. Carrera, if you insist. I’ll see you around noon.” 

When Big John gets back to the kitchen, he sees JJ staring into the bowl of pancake batter guiltily and Kiara looking over the pancake recipe, her brows furrowed together in confusion. He sighs loudly, because that combination can only mean bad things. JJ’s the first to notice Big John. 

“Ah, Big John? What’s the difference between baking powder and baking soda?”

\-----------

Anna Carrera never really loosens up, but occasionally, she’ll let Kiara stay over. For the boys birthdays, or long weekends, or if Kiara does particularly well on a test and her mom wants to reward her, Kiara’s allowed to stay over. Her mom expects all the same rules to apply, and Big John assures her he makes the kids hunker down at 10:00, but sometimes he’ll turn a blind eye if they’re watching a movie or playing a game. He always endures a painstaking phone call from Anna in the days leading up to the sleepover, he always makes sure Kiara goes into John B’s room before he falls asleep, and he always reminds Kiara to text her mom in the morning. It’s a lot of work - a hell of a lot more work than JJ takes. Even Heyward seems to play fast and loose with the rules compared to Anna Carrera. But Big John doesn’t find himself regretting inviting Kiara over, even when he has to listen to Anna Carrera’s spiel for the 47th time.

\-----------

The first time Kiara spends any real amount of time away from the Pogues, she goes on a family vacation to Disneyland. The Wreck has always made okay money, but Mike finally updates the menu and spends a little money on renovations, and business is absolutely booming. There’s finally making enough money to warrant hiring another manager, someone they trust well enough to run the restaurant when they aren’t around. Once they have the new manager, Martha, hired and trained, Anna demands they go on a family vacation. There’s a lot of back and forth between Anna and Mike about where they should go - Europe or a National Park or maybe a beach in the Carribean - and they can’t decide. Then, Anna’s on the phone with her sister, and she mentions their deadlock on the vacation front. Immediately, Anna’s sister invites her to visit - Anna’s sister moved to Orange County after college, and Anna’s never been to visit. In a few weeks time, the Carrera’s are getting up at 3:00 AM to catch a flight to LAX.

They spend a few days at Anna’s sister’s house in San Clemente, and then they drive up an hour to Disneyland and spend the rest of the week in the Disneyland Hotel. 

Aside from a short sojourn across the highway to Universal Hollywood, they stay in the Disney Parks. Kiara’s already on the verge of declaring herself a socialist, and the Walt Disney Company is basically her capitalist nightmare. Even so, she enjoys herself. She’s an 11 year old girl in Disneyland - give her a break. Her cousin Charlotte - a little six year old with abundant energy - makes the entire experience even better. Charlotte believes in every character, and Kiara’s more than happy to play along. It’s the most fun Kiara’s ever had without her boys. 

JJ, John B, and Pope, on the other hand, have a countdown in the Chateau marking the days until Kiara comes home. Secretly, Big John’s also counting down the days - if he thought the Pogues were hard to wrangle, the boys without Kiara are downright hellions.

When Kiara comes back, she’s got a backpack full of gifts for the boys. Her parents gave her an allowance for souvenirs, and she spent almost all of it on things she could bring back to her boys. 

Kiara gets each of them Mickey Mouse ears, a lightsaber for Pope, a Disneyland sweatshirt for John B, and a stuffed Hei Hei from Moana for JJ. 

Pope immediately starts hitting everyone within his wingspan with the lightsaber. When Kiara threatens to take it away from him after the seventh time he hits her arm, he says he’s _"using the force._ ” She tells him she’ll use the force to kick his ass if he doesn’t stop.

John B wears his sweatshirt basically non-stop for the rest of middle school - the only time John B is not wearing it is when one of the other Pogues steal it from his pile of clean laundry. 

JJ tried to play it cool when Kiara presented him with Hei Hei. Kiara’s not much into princess movies, but a few months before her trip, Big John bought Moana for her. He had seen it while flipping through the discounted movies in Walmart, and he insisted that he couldn’t leave it there. He tells Kiara she’s a spitting image of the main character. 

When Big John comes home, he presents Kiara with the new movie and she demands they watch it. Big John microwaves some popcorn and Kiara sits in front of the television completely enthralled the entire time. Big John even joins them, JJ and John B tucked under his arms with Pope and Kiara sit on the floor in front of the couch. When the movie ends, Big John looks at Kiara. 

“You gonna save the world like your twin, Kiara?”

Kiara thinks she just might be able to.

It becomes a thing in the Chateau - Kiara loves watching Moana. Pope and John B don’t like Moana all that much, but JJ’s as enthralled with the Princess as Kiara is. How could he not be? It looks like his best friend, saving the world!

As she hands Hei Hei over, Kiara tells JJ she has a stuffed Pua in her backpack, and JJ has to school his features so he doesn’t show how much it means to him. Kiara’s a little disappointed by JJ’s reaction, because he calls it “cool” but doesn’t elaborate. 

Big John’s particularly loose with the rules that night. Kiara hasn’t seen the boys in a week, he figures she deserves a little bit of leniency. He goes to bed at 7:00, because he has to be up and on the water by 4:00 the next morning, with only a stern warning to Kiara to be in John B’s room around 10:00.

At midnight, Kiara and JJ are still awake and sitting side by side on the hammock, Hei Hei and Pua wedged between them. 

“What’s it like?” JJ asks Kiara, and she sighs. She already knows he’s talking about California. JJ’s never been out of North Carolina. He’s hardly been off the Island. When she told him she was going to California, his eyes got wide and he asked a million questions about the trip. He was amazed that she was taking an airplane, and he was jealous she got to go to Disney. He didn’t even try to hide it. 

“Pretty cool. My parents say we have to go to Europe next, though. They want some culture or whatever.” Kiara says, looking at the stars. She liked California a lot - it was really hot, but way less humid and there weren’t any bugs around. She sat on the back deck with her cousin Charlotte to watch the sunset, and they didn’t have to run inside when the mosquitoes came out. Disney had also been amazing - she smiled at the memories of Charlotte running through Fantasy Land, freaking out about meeting Cinderella. Despite all the good memories, her mom’s already talking about the next family vacation to Paris or London or Rome - somewhere with a lot of history, her mom says. 

“You can’t see the stars anywhere in Los Angeles, though.” Kiara says after a minute of silence. She had noticed it the first night she was there - no matter how late into the night, she couldn’t see many stars. Even several hours outside of the main city, the light pollution drowned out all but the very brightest stars. 

On clear days in Kildare - like tonight - you can see so many stars it’s overwhelming. You can see thousands of them, and they look so close and so far away at the same time, it makes you feel like you are falling into the night sky. A constant reminder that the world is spinning in a much bigger system. It had been disappointing to find that part of home missing in San Clemente. 

“That sucks.” JJ says, tracing a collection of stars with his finger. Kiara’s eyes follow his finger, trying to decide if he’s tracing an actual constellation or a constellation he made up. Kiara can see the faint change in color of the night sky that hides the denser parts of the Milky Way, or the spectacular brightness of Venus by the horizon. Or, JJ told her it was Venus. She’s not sure how he knows, or if he’s lying to her. She decides she doesn’t care - and she never wants to live in a place where she can’t see the stars. “What was your favorite ride?” JJ says after he finishes tracing the maybe real, maybe imaginary constellation. Kiara wants to ask him what it was he was tracing, but instead she answers his question.

“Space Mountain.” Kiara says unironically. “No contest. It’s, like, all in the dark and it looks like you’re traveling through space. It’s … so cool.” 

JJ hums for a second, contemplating Kiara’s answer. “Least favorite ride?” He asks, and Kiara doesn’t even have to think about it. 

“It’s A Small World. No contest.” Kiara says, and JJ laughs at her certainty. Kiara had spent far too long sitting on that godforsaken ride, and even longer waiting in line for it. She had no good will left for it. “Charlotte literally didn’t want to ride anything else. It’s kind of creepy.” 

“Creepy?” JJ asks, and Kiara shrugs. JJ’s curious, because nothing in Disney is supposed to be creepy - except maybe the Haunted Mansion, which Kiara had already told him wasn’t that scary. 

“It’s a bunch of dolls and you're in a boat and they all sing and move. They’re animatronic, or whatever.” Kiara says, and JJ shudders at the thought. 

“That sounds terrible.” JJ says seriously, and he tries to imagine Kiara sitting in a boat, surrounded by creepy dolls singing and dancing, and her little cousin cheering along. The entire image is pretty comical, and it makes him laugh, which causes Kiara to reach over with her elbow and shove him.

“I had to ride it four times in one day.” Kiara says begrudgingly, and JJ just laughs louder. 

Kiara picks up Pua from between them as JJ stops laughing. “Someday we’ll go to Disneyland together.” She says as she looks into the eyes of the pig. JJ scoffs. 

“Are you talking to Pua?” He says, and she looks at him and rolls her eyes.

“No, idiot.” She says, laughing. “I’m talking to you.” 

“Ah, Kiara. Big dreams you got there.” He says, shoving her shoulder. JJ's trying not to get caught up in Kiara's ideas, because he knows better than to hope for things like Disneyland and creepy dolls and cities so big they drown out the stars. Kiara’s a lot of great things, but she’s disillusioned about what’s in store for the rest of the Pogues. She thinks the boys' situations are temporary - that they’ll get off the Cut, go to college, and the four of them will be on equal footing someday. JJ doesn’t know how to tell her that won’t ever happen. 

“I’ll do it. I’ll take you.” Kiara says. JJ decides not to fight Kiara on that - if she wants to believe that someday they’ll go to California together, then he won’t tell her that dream is impossible. If he could afford a little hope, he might have even believed her. Kiara’s got a way of making things happen, of bending reality to her will. Maybe, someday, he’ll ride Space Mountain and the Haunted Mansion and It’s a Small World. 

JJ doesn’t linger on the thought long - Kiara yawns suddenly, reminding him that they are far beyond her bedtime. JJ sighs loudly, rocking to sit up from the hammock. 

“Let’s go to bed.” He says, and Kiara wants to protest. She’s heard the boys talk about stargazing early into the morning, and this is as close as she’s ever gotten. She doesn’t want to go to sleep and ruin it. 

But she’s also been traveling for the last week, and she spent the entire day with the boys. When JJ nudges her to get up off the hammock, she obliges, stumbling into the Chateau half awake before locking herself in John B’s room. 

When she sneaks out of John B’s room at 7:01, JJ is cuddled around Hei Hei like it’s a lifeline. She doesn’t stop smiling for the rest of the day. 

\-----------

Kiara’s watering the vegetable garden at her Grandmother’s house when JJ texts the groupchat. 

Her Grandmother is her mom’s mom - one of the kookiest women Kie has ever met. She loves her Grandmother, but she gets along much better with her dad’s mom, her Nana. Her Grandmother’s house is surrounded by plants and vegetable gardens and hydrangea bushes. Kiara doesn’t like spending too much time inside her Grandmother’s house - there’s a certain expectation of how she should act, how she should talk, and what she should be interested in while she’s in her Grandmother’s presence. Her Grandmother is still not fond of her father, and has never been anything but cold towards him. Her Grandmother loves Kiara as much as any grandmother should, but Kiara knows there’s family turmoil there. It’s complicated, and life is easier outside watering the gardens. 

The sun is beating down on her back, the heat and humidity making every part of her body hot and damp and sticky. She tries to keep cool by periodically running all her limbs under the frigid water that comes out of the hose, but it’s not enough. She’s about ready to call it day, to go inside and tell her Grandmother the weather is making it impossible to work in the gardens, when the group chat lights up with texts. 

_The Pogue Lyfe T-Shirt Company_

_**Johnathan James Maybank** _

_we r teaching pope 2 surf 2day_

**_Pope Heyward_ **

_NO._

**_John Bee Routledge_ **

_YES! I’ve been waiting for this day_

**_Kie Carrera_ **

_I can be at the Chateau in 15 :)_

**_Pope Heyward_ **

_I hate you all._

It’s a particular point of contention among the Pogues that Pope can’t surf - Heyward’s not big into surfing, so he never taught Pope. The other Pogues surf like they walk. John B and JJ have been surfing since 3rd grade, when Big John took them out on two of the rattiest boards you’ve ever seen and tried to teach them everything he had once learned. JJ’s a natural - the board is an extension of his lanky body, and he wields it with the same amount of dexterity. John B’s less of a natural, but he takes to it with enough practice. When Kiara joined the Pogues, her father had already taught her how to surf, but she was nowhere near as naturally gifted as JJ. She has spent every summer since trying to beat JJ in a surfing competition. She has spent every summer losing. 

Pope has seen a surfboard before, but that’s about it. Whenever the other three want to surf, he just stays behind, and JJ is sick of it. He’s instituted a new Pogue rule - the first time any of the Pogues except Kiara have done so. He says that All Pogues Must Surf. 

And so, on a blazing hot day in June, the Pogues are going to teach him. 

Teaching Pope to surf is not a walk in the park. For all that Pope is intelligent and quick witted, he’s never been accused of being agile. He keeps falling off his board, his body far too tense and his balance completely wrong. The three other Pogues yell directions at him as waves come, only to cringe violently when he faceplants into the water. JJ tries to show him a few times, riding a wave in as simply as he can so Pope can see how it’s done. It’s not that the attempts are completely unsuccessful, it’s just a slow going process. When Pope stands on his board for more than a few seconds, Kiara and John B cheer as loudly as they can while JJ stares in amazement. 

Pope decides he’s too tired to continue after a few hours, and Kiara paddles in with him as JJ and John B promise to catch “a few more waves.”  


Pope and Kiara are sitting on the beach talking as John B and JJ surf, discussing what board Pope should get. Despite all the failures Pope endured in his lesson, he likes that he’s finally learning to surf. Being left out of Pogue Surf Days sucked. He’s ready to learn, but he hates the ratty board JJ found in John B’s shed. He’s certain that having a better board will make it easier. Kiara’s trying to convince him that he should probably learn to stand up without falling over before he purchases a new board.

A few minutes into their conversation, Kiara looks out to the water and sees John B paddling around frantically. She scans her eyes around the horizon and doesn’t see JJ. When John B looks at her, even from 100 feet out, she can see the panic on John B’s face. 

She’s up and running towards the water with her board before she can fully comprehend it. She screams “ _where’s JJ_ ” at John B as she paddles out, and John B doesn’t answer. When she’s about halfway out, John B rolls off his board, disappearing into the water. By the time Kiara reaches his board, John B is resurfacing with his arm around JJ. 

Kiara reaches around John B, helping him pull JJ out of the water and onto her board. It’s a little bit of an awkward situation - JJ haphazardly draped across the front of her board, her laying down perpendicular to him - but Kiara’s too focused on the fact that JJ was just underwater to think about it too closely.

“Get him to the sand!” John B yells, shoving Kiara’s board around and pushing her violently towards shore. JJ’s coughing up water, but he’s conscious, gripping onto Kiara’s board as she paddles frantically for shore. JJ spits up some water, looks back at her and croaks out “ _my board_.” She ignores him.

It takes far too long, but eventually she gets to water shallow enough to walk in and Pope meets her, shouting at her to tell him what happened. Kiara doesn’t answer, just takes one of JJ’s arma and loops it around her shoulders. Pope follows suit, helping Kiara stand despite JJ’s protests, and together they drag him to the sand before letting him stand up on his own feet. 

“Chill out!” JJ yells, coughing. He bends over at the waist, dry heaves for a second before he calms down. After a second, he straightens out. “I went under and swallowed some water! I’m fine!” 

“Jesus Christ.” Kiara says, turning away from JJ and holding her head. John B is trying to gather JJ’s, Kiara’s, and his own board onto land. One lanky middle schooler versus three surfboards is not good odds - Kiara’s has half a mind to go help him wrangle the surfboards, but John B just points to JJ. 

“Is JJ okay?” John B yells from the water, and JJ turns around to look at his friend.

“I’m fine! Calm the hell down!” JJ yells back. 

“You scared us!” Kiara yells, turning her body to look at him. JJ throws his hands up, looking at her like she’s crazy. And maybe she is - she feels a little crazy. Her entire body is shaking, it feels like her mind is going a million miles an hour. It feels like part of her is still stuck in the half a minute between her realizing JJ was missing and John B pulling him out of the water. JJ may be fine, he may be standing right in front of her, but part of Kiara is still flipping out at the fact that she didn’t see him bobbing on the horizon. 

“Sorry? I guess?” JJ says, and Kiara harrumphs. As if that’s a good enough apology for how hard her heart is beating. 

“What happened?!” John B asked as he approached the group, having wrangled all the surfboards onto the sand. John B’s voice is as frantic as Kiara feels - his tone makes him sound like he might be on the verge of tears. Kiara’s almost glad John B’s reacting like that - it makes her feel like her emotions are justified. 

“I don’t know, man. A wave caught me and I tipped and then I couldn’t figure out which way was up.” JJ says, and Kiara turns away again, saying _“oh my god”_ under her breath. The thought of JJ not being able to find his way out of the water is a newfound worst fear. She wants to buy him several life jackets, or a floaty - something, anything that will make sure he comes up for air every time. 

“Well, uh, don’t do that again.” Pope says, and JJ rolls his eyes. The warning from Pope is almost a well received sign of normality in the face of John B and Kiara’s over reaction. 

“Yeah, thanks, Pope. Noted.”

Kiara stands at the counter, chopping each zucchini into quarters and then slicing them into slivers. She got the zucchini from her Grandmother - when she ran into the house to tell her Grandmother she was leaving, her Grandmother had shoved a twenty dollar bill and enough zucchini to feed a small army into Kiara’s arms as thanks for watering. Kiara hadn’t wanted to stop at home to drop the vegetables off, so she just brought them with her to the Chateau.

She’s learning to cook from her dad, trying to figure out how to help out in the kitchen when she officially starts working at The Wreck. Her dad hasn’t taught her much, just the basics - how to chop vegetables, prepare chicken, and make pancake batter. He’s also taught her his golden rule - almost anything in the world will taste good if you saute it with a lot of olive oil, garlic, onions, and salt. Kiara’s found that it hasn’t failed her yet. She knows Big John won’t be home tonight, and the boys were planning on microwaving a pizza. She’s hoping to stave off scurvy with a batch of zucchini. 

Or, that’s what she tells the boys when she yells at them to leave her alone in the kitchen. Really, she’s just trying to do something normal, something her hands know so they won’t shake as much. It’s a dull task to chop zucchini, and that’s exactly what she needs. 

As per usual, her initial threat to the boys is met with blind obedience - when she tells the boys to go outside and leave her alone, the door is open and they are out of the living room before she can even truly threaten them. And, as per usual, the first boy to test the limits of her goodwill is JJ, the precise reason she’s so tense in the first place.

He enters the Chateau with his hands in the air, blurting out that he has to go to the bathroom before Kiara can threaten him again. He’s aware that this time, she’s holding a knife, and her threat would hold that much more weight. 

She ignores him as he scurries to the bathroom, and then tries to ignore him as he leaves. Instead of heading straight to the door, he sits by the edge of the counter - suspiciously out of her swinging range.

“You shouldn’t be mad at John B and Pope because of me.” JJ says after a moment of silence, and Kiara rolls her eyes and slams the knife down. JJ’s eyes widen, but he’s thankful she’s putting the knife down. He’s had enough near death experiences for one day, thank you very much. He’s halfway tempted to grab it and throw it as far as he can across the room so she can’t threaten him with it, but he also knows she won’t actually hurt him. Plus, there are other knives in the kitchen she could pick up instead. 

“I’m not mad.” She says, turning from JJ and scraping minced garlic into a pan with hot olive oil. At home, she has a garlic press, but the Chateau has no such luxuries. Instead, she just did a bad job mincing the garlic by hand. It’ll be fine, the boys won’t notice.

“Coulda fooled me.” JJ says, and she turns to glare at him. He just looks at her. “I’m serious - you can be mad at me, whatever. But you have no right to be mad at John B and Pope.”

“You don’t get to tell me what I have the right to be!” Kiara says, and JJ hangs his head. He really doesn’t want to turn this into a fight about Kiara being allowed to do things, and male privilege, and the crushing weight of the patriarchy. He knows, from Kiara’s discussions on the topic, that those are all important things to fight against. He also knows that there’s no way he’s going to solve them, and the entire point of this conversation will be derailed if he lets it go down that road. Kiara’s a great debater, but sometimes you have to be careful to stay on topic. 

“Kiara -” He starts, and she cuts him off. 

“Don’t Kiara me!” She says sharply, and then she takes a deep breath. Counts to ten. Tries to remember that she’s having a conversation with her best friend, and she doesn’t need to fight with him. “I’m not mad, honestly. At anyone.” JJ doesn’t say anything, just quirks an eyebrow at her so she knows how he feels. “I’m just - I don’t know, stressed out.” 

“Why? Cause you thought I drowned?” JJ says, and Kiara wants to smack him for being so cavalier about her newfound worst fear. Previously, she hadn’t thought of JJ as anything but the most natural surfer, a kid so comfortable on the water that the fear of drowning hadn’t crossed her mind. The fact that JJ’s not invincible shouldn’t rattle her as much as it does. Kiara’s pretty sure she never wants to go surfing again. 

“Yes, cause you almost drowned!” Kiara says, running a hand through her hair. She doesn’t know how to put into words what she is feeling - at least, not in a way that won’t scare JJ. She tries anyway. “I mean, honestly, JJ, what did you expect? That was scary.” 

“You were scared you were going to lose me?” He says, smiling with a glint in his eye and a teasing tilt to his voice. She recognizes what he’s doing - he’s trying to deflect. He’s trying to use humor and terrible flirting skills to get Kiara to stop being so emotional. It’s not the first time he’s done it, and Kiara knows the tactic well. It’s the same tactic she’s met with if she asks too many questions about his family. She’s always given JJ his space when he’s tried to cover up his feelings, but not today. 

Kiara looks him directly in the eye. “Yes.” JJ swallows thickly when she says it, because he was trying to make a joke, he was trying to break the tension, but Kiara’s response made it a hundred times more serious. 

“Kie …” He says, and she shakes her head, turning to put chopped onions in the pan. She doesn’t need to freak the kid out, she doesn’t want him worrying about her. But she also needs him to know that she wouldn’t be able to stand it if something bad happened to him.

“I know it wasn’t that serious, and I know that you are fine, but it doesn’t mean I wasn’t scared. It was scary.” She finally says, and JJ sighs.

“Yeah, yeah it was.” JJ concedes, and Kiara feels a little bit of the weight lifted off her chest. It was still scary and borderline traumatic, but JJ’s not shutting her out. He’s agreeing with her, even talking to her about it. It makes her feel a million times better.

“Kie?” JJ says after a minute, and she hums as she turns to him. “You aren’t going to lose me.” 

\-----------

Kiara’s team loses the seventh grade debate tournament. Well, they don't lose - her team comes in 3rd. Despite the fact that they are the only seventh grader team in the top ten, it’s as good as a wash for Kiara. She doesn’t stop practicing her debate techniques for a full year. By the time the eighth grade debate tournament comes around, the boys have each debated with her on every issue from pollution to the European Union’s trade laws. JJ learns more in his debates with Kiara than he does in an entire semester of school. They are all desperate for her to just win the tournament already. 

Pope joins the tournament late, at the behest of his English teacher. She prompts him into signing up by promising it looks good on scholarship applications. Pope’s not obsessed with winning like Kiara is - he’s debated her at least a hundred times, and he knows he won’t be able to beat her in the tournament. He also knows that coming in the top ten would be enough to be impressive, and he thinks he has a chance at that. 

The morning of the debate tournament, JJ and John B meet Kiara and Pope outside the auditorium. Kiara is dressed in a little pantsuit, Pope in a little suit. Kiara carries a briefcase and a pad of legal paper. Pope comes in with a few pieces of loose paper and a dull pencil. JJ and John B are dressed in sweatpants. They are a sight to see, standing by the bleachers as Pope and Kiara prepare for the tournament. Kiara’s parents sit in the front row, and Pope’s mom sits next to them. They make polite small talk, but nothing more.

Pope has a pretty good team - he’s joined by Maisy Huffman and James Hartt. They make an okay, if eclectic, group. They were put together by Pope’s English teacher because they are all pretty smart and work well enough together. They have nothing on Kiara’s team - she hand picks Aidan Wade and Cassidy Evans. Cassidy is incredibly intelligent - almost as smart as Pope. She’s quiet, though, so Kiara and Aidan take care of most of the talking. Cassidy can whip out facts, statistics, and reports almost as fast as the opposition team can make their statements. Kiara and Aidan can weave together a thorough statement from her materials in seconds. They learn their rhythm and their place on the team in the year between the tournaments, and by the time the eighth grade debate comes around, Kiara and her team are ready to dominate. 

And dominate they do. The tournament is 4 tiers - two rounds, followed by the semi-finals and then the finals. Both Kiara and Pope’s teams make it through the first two rounds, and then their teams are pitted against each other in the semi-finals. John B’s tense, because Kiara and Pope are his best friends and he can’t imagine picking a side in this particular battle. JJ, on the other hand, gets scolded by one of the moderators for cheering too loudly for Kiara. 

When John B chastises him for picking a side, JJ gives him a look. “What? Kiara wants this way more than Pope does - Pope’s only competing because it’s good for college.”

“That doesn’t mean you can pick a side!” John B says. JJ just turns away from him and cheers even louder when Kiara finishes her first argument. 

JJ’s not that into debating, but when Kiara finishes her rebuttal, he’s on his feet. Her team was proposition for the motion “ _the death penalty should be abolished in the United States._ ” Her closing arguments are such a slam dunk, even JJ can tell that Kiara’s won the debate, and normally he can’t even understand the scoring system. By the time Kiara yields her time, both him and John B are on their feet, hollering loudly. Kiara gives them a look because they are embarrassing her, and the moderator threatens to kick them out, but the boys don’t care. Kiara just dunked on Pope with a finely-detailed argument. It’s a sight to behold. 

JJ and John B do get kicked out of the auditorium during the final round. During Kiara’s first proposition constructive for the final round, one of the boys on the other team tries to make a point of information during her protected time. She barely breaks her rhythm as she informs her opponent that they are out of order. The boys whoop loudly as she does so, because the look on the other kids face is astonished, and they end up getting kicked out. 

JJ and John B stay around the playground until Pope runs out from the auditorium. He sneaks them back in so they can see Kiara receive the trophy for first place, and the three boys yell so loudly from the back that the security officers chase them off the property. Pope never gets to pick up his ribbon for third place.

When Kiara finally finds them at Rixton’s cove, after leaving the new trophy with her parents, all three of them sweep her up in hugs, talking about how kick ass she is on the debate team. Pope says he’s angry at them for cheering so loudly for Kiara, but there’s a smile on his face as he says it. 

John B, JJ, and Kiara make up for it by rallying at Pope’s chess tournament. JJ and Kiara get kicked out of the chess tournament after JJ yells “ _fuck yeah!_ ” when Pope checkmates his opponent in the semi-finals. Kiara jumps up with him, cheering loudly. John B’s too confused to understand what’s going on, he just sits in his chair and looks around when the school resource officer kicks JJ and Kiara out. 

\-----------

Cassidy Evans kisses Travis Williams on a Friday night near the end of eighth grade. It’s the same Cassidy and Travis from the disastrous Tanny Hill Challenge - the girl too worried to let her best friend get in a fight with JJ. Kiara’s pretty friendly with Cassidy - they won the debate tournament together and occasionally they will hang out outside of school. Kiara wouldn’t label Cassidy her best friend, but they get along well enough. Travis and JJ are also kind of friends - while Pope and John B never really warmed up to him, JJ will hang out with Travis and Mark Smith on the rare occasion that the other Pogues are busy. It’s a strange friendship, but it gives JJ options when the Pogues are busy.

It’s from Mark that JJ learns about the kiss. On a school night when Kiara and Pope have too much homework and John B has a dentist appointment, JJ hangs out with Mark and Travis in Travis’s backyard. Travis and JJ are talking about the new dirt bike Travis’s dad bought when Mark makes a jab about Cassidy. When Travis’s face turns red, JJ demands to be told what happened. 

Mark relays the story while Travis tries to downplay the drama. Mark tells JJ how Cassidy and Travis were at Charles Nash’s birthday party, dancing and hanging out like they had for years. They went outside to cool off, and Cassidy had kissed him, with very little warning, behind the clothesline. Travis told her they should stay friends, Cassidy had basically scampered away, hurt and dejected. Travis hadn’t seen her after that at the party, and then he had tried to talk to her at school and she had been incredibly awkward the entire time.

“You still friends with the Kook girl?” Travis asks JJ once Mark finishes his story. “The hot one?” 

JJ knows Travis is talking about Kiara, and he knows Travis doesn’t mean anything by his comments. JJ also knows that he could beat Travis’s ass for calling Kiara a Kook. 

“Her name is Kiara, and she’s not a Kook.” JJ informs Travis, and Travis just nods. 

“You still friends with her?” Travis asks again, and JJ nods again because, duh, of course he’s still friends with her. Kiara’s like an integral part of his life at this point - he can’t imagine not being friends with her. 

“Yeah, she’s my best friend.” JJ says, and Mark looks up at him.

“I thought John B was your best friend?” Mark says, and JJ shrugs.

“He is, too. John B and Kiara and Pope are all my best friend.” JJ says, as if it’s the most obvious thing in the world. He’s never had a problem splitting the best friend title between the three of them - there’s no competition. John B and him share the most secrets, Kiara and him get along the best, and Pope makes him laugh the most. There’s no way to rank any of them above another - they are all best friends.

“That’s besides the point - look, J, if you want to keep your friend group together, you can’t mack Kiara.” Travis says, looking at JJ like he’s giving some sort of sage advice. JJ decides to take his words to heart - Travis and Cassidy’s friend group is shattered because Cassidy macked on him. Maybe there is a lesson to be learned from Travis and Cassidy’s disaster. 

It’s not like JJ has never thought about kissing Kiara - like Travis said, she’s hot, and she’s his best friend, and they are around each other all the time. He thinks that someday, Kiara might date one of them, because he thinks they might be too close for that not to happen. He doesn’t think it’ll be him. 

But he hasn’t thought about it in any sort of reality - he hasn’t thought about actually kissing her, about the aftermath of what would happen to their friend group, about what would happen if they suddenly had to deal with romantic feelings. JJ shudders at the thought - Travis is right, it would ruin the Pogues. 

“Mark said it’s just super awkward now.” JJ says as he finishes telling the rest of the Pogues the story Mark told him. He leaves out the warning from Travis about Kiara - no need to bring that up. It would start a disaster that JJ can only imagine would end incredibly poorly, or with Kiara lecturing him about consent.

The rest of the Pogues are spread around the campfire in John B’s backyard - Kiara’s on a lawn chair, about ready to fall asleep, her hair falling out of her bun in chunks, with her legs pulled up to her chest and a blanket tucked around her body. Pope and John B are laying down on a beach towel on the other side of the fire, their bodies side by side but their heads on opposite sides of the towels. Pope keeps complaining that John B’s feet stink. JJ’s sitting on a log near them, relaying the story while downing a can of Mountain Dew. 

“When was this? At Charlie’s party?” Kiara asks, not even bothering to lift her head from the lawn chair. They had spent another successful day teaching Pope to surf, and he’s getting good enough that he can ride in some waves without falling. It was also Kiara’s first time back on her surfboard since JJ almost drowned, and she spent the whole time flipping out and being over cautious. It was emotionally draining, though she ended up having a good time, and now she just wants to go to bed now. She also won’t go to bed first, because the boys will give her a hard time. JJ likes to joke that Kiara can’t stay up past midnight because she’s Cinderella - she’ll turn into a pumpkin at midnight. Kiara likes to remind him that the story doesn’t end with Cinderella turning into a pumpkin, and JJ likes to retort with the fact that Kiara has stayed up past midnight only a handful of times in her life. John B and Pope agree that the evidence for Kiara being Pumpkin Cinderella is overwhelming. 

Besides, her and Big John are taking turns ignoring the 10:00 rule her mother still expects her to follow. She doesn’t want to ruin her freedom with something as unnecessary as sleep. 

“Yeah, last week.” JJ answers, taking another sip from his can of soda.

“And Travis shot her down?” John B asks, throwing an acorn up into the branches of the tree. 

“Like a missile.” JJ says, mimicking a missile flying through the air with his hand.

“But Cassidy’s great.” Pope says, and the Pogues turn to look at him. Even Kiara lifts her head. “I mean, objectively speaking. She’s pretty. And super nice.”

“She’s smart too, which makes me wonder why she kissed Travis.” Kiara says, laying her head back down and shifting in her seat. “She could do better than him.” 

“I don’t know, I just know their entire friend group is screwed because of it. Cassidy feels awkward, Mark’s giving them both crap, Travis just wants things to go back to normal.” JJ says, trying to ignore the nagging voice in the back of his head that says they are talking about Cassidy and Travis but they could also be talking about him and Kiara. 

“That can never be us.” Kiara says from her seat. She looks up long enough to declare “New Pogue rule: No Pogue on Pogue macking. We can’t end up like Mark and Cassidy and Travis.” 

“Agreed.” JJ says, and he’s thankful Kiara’s said it. He’s thankful she seems to read his mind. If he tried to make a new rule, he would have blabbered on and on, talking about not kissing Kiara and awkward friendships. He’s certain if he had opened his mouth, he would have gotten in trouble. But Kiara says it like it’s simple, like it’s a fact, and there it is: No Pogue on Pogue macking. It’s far simpler when Kiara takes the wheel.

“Agreed.” John B and Pope say in unison.

And so they have a new rule. Nothing goes wrong as long as they follow the rules. Little do they know, that rule will be shot to hell in a few years time. 


	5. The Willard T. Bothwell Scholarship and Other Disasters

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello and welcome back to another chapter!! Before we get started, I want to let you know that there are some mentions of racism and racist undertones in this chapter. If that’s something that would be triggering to you, I wanted to warn you before the chapter started. Given that this story has two main characters who are Black, I felt it was necessary to address racism in some form. I felt it was especially necessary given that the story is based in North Carolina, and there have been some difficult conversations happening around race in North Carolina, as well as all over the United States, in the last couple of years.
> 
> This chapter is probably the biggest stretch I made when writing this story, cause there is absolutely no mention of a scholarship like the one in this chapter on the show, but I feel like something like this would exist. I also feel like it would explain some of Pope’s ~*feels*~, and his obsession with the college scholarship, and his reaction when he lost it.
> 
> I’m so glad you guys are still enjoying the story, and I’m extremely flattered by the kudos and the comments!! We’ll be getting into the more intense high school drama soon, but for now, I hope you guys enjoy this chapter!

It’s a Friday in May at Kildare County Middle School, and Kiara would normally want to be _anywhere_ except the school’s awards assembly. She’s been to the awards assembly every year since she 5th grade, and she has a bone to pick with the teachers who regularly plan a 3 hour long ceremony that always happens to land on one of the most beautiful days. Kiara could be out on her surfboard, or the HMS Pogue, or getting ice cream at the Wreck. But no - instead, she’s stuck in her school’s auditorium, listening to what seems like the twenty fifth Old White Dude talk about the importance of _scholarship_ or _athleticism_ or whatever they decided to put their Old White Dude money behind. It would normally be her least favorite day of the school year.

But today, she’s buzzing with nerves and excitement. The awards assembly is dominated by non-monetary awards - most of them are virtually useless commendations for one thing or another. A few awards will even get student’s names engraved on something called a “perpetual plaque'' in the school hallway. But there’s one award that stands out from the rest - the Willard T. Bothwell Scholarship. The awards assembly culminates in the announcement of the scholarship recipient, and Kiara cannot wait.

Kiara’s parents are wealthy, but not private-education-at-fifth-grade wealthy. While Kie attended public middle school, they saved up so she could attend the Kildare Coast Secondary Academy for high school. Kildare Coast was a prep school for the Kooks, a place draped in old money and outdated traditions. John B and JJ exclusively call it the Kook Academy - she’s not even sure if they know it’s real name. Most of the Academy’s students are funneled from the equally preppy, equally pompous Kildare Coast Elementary School, which stands across the street from the Academy. The two schools are endowed by the wealthiest families on the island so their children won’t have to go away for a top level private education. The price tag to go to either school is downright criminal - Kiara can’t believe her parents are willing to pay such a sum of cash for some old man to tell her to read Shakespeare, but her mom likes to remind her that “ _high school is important for college, and college is important for a job”_.

Not that Kie really cares about any of that anyways. She wrote her eighth grade career research paper on volunteering at an elephant sanctuary in India. She’s pretty sure she would be the first Kook Academy attendee to actively decide not to go to college. She’s still not sure how she’s going to travel the world, much less save it, but she will figure it out. And Kildare Coast Secondary Academy will be absolutely no help to her cause whatsoever. She’s not enthralled with the idea of attending. Kiara applied, because her parents told her too, and her Grandmother threw a little bit of her weight around with the Island Club, and Kiara was admitted. She wasn’t enrolled yet, because there was a non-refundable $2000 deposit for the school, and Kiara’s parents hadn’t wanted to choke up that money yet. Kiara didn’t want them to ever choke up that money. 

But then, Pope told her he was applying for a scholarship to the Academy, and the entire prospect brightened. There’s one full ride scholarship to the Kildare Coast Secondary Academy every year - the Willard T. Bothwell Scholarship. It’s typically given to a kid from the Cut as a show of good faith on the side of the Academy. Mostly, they use it as a bargaining chip when they need new building permits from the county. A sly reminder from the Academy’s school board that they generously allow one student to attend tuition free every year works wonders to cut through bureaucratic tape. 

Each year, eighth grade students apply and interview for the scholarship. Kiara had applied for the scholarship too, but she didn't get far enough to even get an interview. Her parents were mildly disappointed, but remained convinced that the best thing for Kiara was attending the Academy. And Kiara is absolutely, positively, 100% certain Pope is going to win the scholarship and end up going to school with her. He’s clearly the smartest in their grade, even though Kie pummeled him in the Kildare County Middle School Debate Tournament (she likes to remind him of her slam dunk closing argument against him when his head gets too big). He said his interview went well, and she read over his personal statement three times to check for spelling mistakes. Kiara knows he is going to win because he has the best grades, the most motivation, and the cleanest record of any kid at Kildare County.

In addition to all that, Kie knows he is going to win the scholarship because it is the only thing that’s going to keep her alive in the Academy. If Pope is at the Academy with her, it doesn’t matter if she’s surrounded by every Kook on the island, she’ll be able to survive. Sure, she’d prefer if both JJ and John B could also be in her classes, but she has to take what she can get. And if Pope going to the Academy is what she can get, then by god, she is going to run with it.

That’s why Kie is practically buzzing in her seat as the lesser awards are called, waiting for the last one, the most important one, to be called so she can jump up and cheer and finally breathe a sigh of relief because she isn’t going to be alone next year. For now, she sits in her chair, her hands gripping the sides of the plastic seat, her upper body bent slightly forward as if she’s ready to jump out of her chair at any given moment. 

“Jesus, Kie, I think you’re more nervous than Pope.” JJ whispers to her, tilting his head so far over he’s almost resting it on her shoulder. He keeps his voice quiet, both for Pope’s sake and because of the teachers roaming the aisle of the assembly. Juxtaposed with Kiara’s tense figure, JJ looks like the calmest person on the planet. He’s slouched in his seat, his hands stuffed into the pockets of his sweatpants. Kiara’s seen him fall asleep twice in the two and half hours since the program began, and each time she had to resist the urge to violently shove him awake. She wasn’t able to sleep last night, in her own bed, because her stomach was in knots. How in the world is he able to sleep in the middle of the ceremony, with the Willard T. Bothwell Scholarship announcement bearing down on them? She doesn’t know if she’s mad that he’s nonchalant about it, or if she’s just jealous that the next four years of his life don’t depend on the announcement. 

The four Pogues are seated in a row - Pope next to the aisle, then John B, then Kie and finally, JJ. At JJ’s words, both he and Kie lean forward slightly in their seats, venturing a look at their friend at the end of the row. Pope’s legs are bouncing up and down, his hands alternatively fidgeting with the program he was handed when he walked into the assembly and drumming an unrecognizable beat on his knee. Kie’s pretty sure he’s sweating, even though the air conditioning in the auditorium is strong enough that her thick wool sweater doesn’t feel hearty enough. 

“Nevermind.” JJ breathes out, as he slouches back in his seat. Kiara takes a deep breath before leaning her head over to JJ. Her curly hair falls onto his shoulder as she does so, and he makes a small show of flicking her hair away. 

“There’s a lot riding on this.” She says, barely above a whisper and just loud enough for JJ to hear it. JJ turns his head slightly, fixing her with a look. “For him.” She clarifies, and he scoffs at her. His scoff is a little too loud, and one of the teachers monitoring the crowd looks at him sternly. Both Kiara and JJ immediately sit up straighter, pretending they weren’t doing anything but paying rapt attention to the announcement of the awards for perfect attendance. 

JJ’s silent for a moment as the teacher stares at them. Kie goes back to buzzing with energy and trying to pretend to focus on the assembly. JJ’s voice is quieter the next time he speaks. “I know this also means a lot to you, Kie. For both of your sakes, I wish they’d just call out his name already.”

Kie nods minutely, agreeing with JJ, and they fall into silence for the next several minutes. It’s not until the headmaster of the Kildare Coast Secondary Academy gets onstage that any of the Pogues interact again. When the old man approaches the microphone, all four Pogues lock hands without thinking. Pope’s hands are sweaty in John B’s palms, and Kiara’s are shaking slightly. JJ and John B don’t have real skin in the game - they were never going to the Academy, they were always going to end up at Kildare County Public High School. But Pope and Kiara are relying on this scholarship to make life for both of them easier, if in different ways. JJ and John B have talked briefly, alone on the couch at the Chateau, about what it would mean for them if Kiara and Pope both went to the Academy. Don’t get them wrong, they want this more than anything - this could change Pope’s life, and if Pope is at the Academy, Kiara will have an ally. They want what’s best for their friends, but they also admitted, in a dark room with no one else around, that in a selfishly perfect world, Kiara and Pope would be with them at Kildare High. When JJ takes Kiara’s hand, he means what he says - he really just wants the Headmaster to say _“Pope Heyward”_ and move on, despite his selfish dreams.

“Hello students of Kildare County Middle School. My name is Headmaster Kerry, and I am here on behalf of The Kildare Coast Secondary Academy. I am presenting the Willard T. Bothwell Scholarship to one student who will join us next fall on a full scholarship. All of our applicants were extremely well rounded, and …” 

Kiara has to tune out the headmaster, because hanging on his every word is throwing her anxiety through the roof. JJ can feel her hands shaking and he wraps both of his hands around hers as the Headmaster discusses _merit_ and _honor_ and _intellectual curiosity._

By the time the Headmaster gets around to announcing the name, Kie wants to jump out of her seat and scream “ _get on with it already!_ ” The only thing truly stopping her from verbally abusing the Headmaster in front of the entire middle school is John B and JJ’s hands in both of hers. They are trying to ground her and Pope, so she doesn’t do something like storm the stage and Pope doesn’t do something like pass out.

“Without further ado, I am ecstatic to present to you this year's recipient of the Willard T. Bothwell Scholarship, Miss Cassidy Evans!” Headmaster Kerry says from the stage, and Kie’s world falls apart. It feels like the world is silent for a moment, although the people around the Pogues are cheering loudly. Kie’s breath catches in her throat, and she’s almost certain she heard the Headmaster wrong. There could be _no way_ that Pope lost - it’s unthinkable. She has to be hallucinating, or dreaming, or having some vivid auditory mishap. She sees Cassidy look back at Pope from her seat a few rows ahead, as if she can’t believe it either, and then she feels JJ’s hand tighten around hers minutely while John B’s hand falls away, and she knows it’s none of those things - it’s really happening. Pope really lost the scholarship, to Cassidy Evans. Kiara’s stunned, to say the least. It’s not that Cassidy is unintelligent in any way, but she’s clearly a runner up to Pope’s _merit_ and _honor_ and _intellectual curiosity_ and whatever other shit the Headmaster said up there. 

As Cassidy stands and walks to the stage to accept the certificate, her face is beet red. Kiara, in any other circumstance, would feel bad for Cassidy. She’s not a fan of crowds or attention, especially in mass amounts like the awards assembly. It’s one of the reasons Cassidy doesn’t speak much during their debates.

But Cassidy just won a scholarship that was all but designed for Pope, and Kiara can’t believe it. Is it because Kiara and Cassidy won the debate tournament? It has to be - there’s nothing else that Cassidy has that Pope doesn’t have. Except - well, there is one thing. 

Kiara doesn’t even realize she’s starting to stand until she feels JJ’s arms pulling her back into her seat. 

“Not now, Kie. Not now.” He says, but she doesn’t really hear him. She’s ready to start yelling about the inequity of it all, how unfair it is that the smartest kid in the class can’t go to the rich school. She wants to scream at the headmaster, ask the crusty old man what Cassidy has that Pope doesn’t, ask him if it has anything to do with the fact that Cassidy _looks like every other student that goes to the Academy_. Kiara wants to go on a rampage. 

Before she can start yelling, JJ is slapping a hand over her mouth and silencing her. Kiara is stunned - she turns to JJ, and for a split second, all her rage about the Academy and the scholarship and inequality at large is focused on JJ. For what it’s worth, the boy barely flinches. His eyes meet hers and there’s very little empathy in them. They’re hard, like he’s trying to scold her. It gives her pause. “Not. Now.” He says again, and he nods once over her shoulder. 

She looks back for a second to see Pope, and her entire body collapses. Her rage is there, as painful and loud as before, but Pope is sitting in his seat, eyes staring blankly to where Cassidy Evans is getting her picture taken. John B has an arm around Pope’s shoulder, looking at once like his trying to both comfort Pope and keep him upright. This isn’t about Kiara - it never was - and she can’t be selfish right now. Causing a scene would only make everything worse for Pope. She sits back in her seat, trying to even her breathing and ignore how JJ is staring at her.

  
  


The assembly ends rather unceremoniously for something that just shredded the fabric of Kiara’s future. The scholarship is announced, and then the Middle School Vice Principal gets on stage to announce that everyone has to report back to their homerooms before they are dismissed for the half day. Normally, Kiara would be ecstatic to have a half day of school and a ton of sunshine to enjoy. 

Now, Kiara can barely comprehend his words. At some point, JJ’s hand slips away, and then they are standing and being filed out of the auditorium like a school of fish. When the four Pogues get through the doors of the auditorium, Pope takes off for the front door of the school, bursting through them as the teachers yell at him to stop. John B takes off after him, but JJ stops Kiara before she can follow. 

“Kiara, you need to stay here.” He says, his hands on her shoulders trying to stop her forward motion. The teachers are too focused on chasing John B and Pope to focus on JJ and Kiara. 

“We need to find Pope! He _needs_ us!” She says, pushing against JJ’s chest as he tries to hold her back. He stumbles a few feet out of line, but she doesn’t get as far as she hoped she would. Some students around them are starting to take note of the commotion, but most are focused on getting to homeroom and out of school.

“Kiara, stop - “ JJ says, trying to force her to pay attention to him. He tries to look her in the eyes, but she has her eyes trained on the door Pope left out of. It’d be so much easier if she looked at him and saw what he wanted to say. “You need to stay here!”

“Stop, JJ, that’s bullshit!” Kiara says, trying to hit his arms away. She makes it out of his grasp, going a few feet before JJ sighs and says the only thing that he knows will stop her from finding Pope. 

“He’s not going to want to see you!” JJ finally says, and that stops Kiara in her tracks. 

When she turns to look at him, JJ hates the look on her face. He also knows she needs to tell her the truth. She wouldn’t have stopped until she found Pope. And, honestly, seeing Kiara would only make Pope more upset right now - JJ knows that, and he knows Kiara needs to know it. “I mean this in the least offensive way possible, but I don’t think seeing you would help him right now.” JJ says, quieter this time. 

“JJ! “ She scolds, her voice offended and angry. She crosses her arms across her chest, and JJ can tell that Kiara’s ready to argue with him. He doesn’t have time for that - or the emotional availability. There’s only so much JJ can deal with, and today, he has to deal with Pope first and foremost. 

“Look, John B and I will find him and calm him down, and we’ll meet you at the Chateau when he’s ready.” JJ says, stepping around her, towards the front door. 

“JJ - ” She repeats, her voice more hurt then offended this time, as if she’s realizing how serious he is about leaving her behind. She spins around to face him, maybe to try and talk some sense into him, but he’s already gone, dodging a few teachers trying to stop him from leaving. 

“Grab his backpack!” JJ yells over his shoulder as he bursts through the doors of the school to follow John B and Pope. 

Kiara stumbles back as JJ exits the school, as teachers swarm the hallways to make sure no other students make a break for the exit. JJ timed it just right - even if Kiara wanted to follow them, she would be stopped by a teacher. She sees his figure through the glass doors of the school, darting around the playground and leaping over the fence, as she’s herded into a line to go to her homeroom classroom. 

Kiara’s tries not to focus on the fact that it feels like she might have just lost her boys. 

  
  


John B and JJ find Pope at his house. The search around the docks and around Heyward's shop before John B asks JJ where he would go if he was Pope, and JJ knows exactly where to find him. They ring the doorbell to the Heyward household 10 minutes later and by the look on Mrs. Heyward's face, they know Pope already told her what happened. 

Pope is sitting at the kitchen table when his mom lets them into the house, and she tells them all to take a seat while she makes a snack. John B and JJ approach the table cautiously, sitting down on either side of Pope. Pope is staring at the table top, his hands in his lap and an untouched glass of milk in front of him. 

“I’m sorry, Pope.” John B starts, because neither of them know how to deal with this. He looks at JJ from across the table and JJ shrugs back at him like _I don't know, that's probably a good start._

“Nothing for you to be sorry for. It’s not your fault I’m not good enough for the Kook Academy.” Pope says quietly, not looking up from the table. Pope keeps his voice quiet - his mom tried not to cry when he had told her he lost, but he knew how excited she was for him to go to the Academy. His mom doesn't need to hear Pope beat himself up - it'll only make her feel worse.

“Come on, Pope, we all know the Academy is missing out by not taking you - “ JJ says, reaching out to pat Pope on the back. He's doing his best at comforting, and it seems to be having the opposite effect.

“Clearly not. If they thought I was good enough, they would have chosen me.” Pope says harshly, finally looking up from the table and at JJ. JJ thinks Mrs. Heyward must hear Pope this time, because he hears her sniffle in the kitchen. 

“You can’t think like that, man. The Kooks clearly aren’t thinking this through. You were the best option, but they don’t want you to upstage their own children.” John B says, and JJ runs with the thought, snapping his fingers at John B. 

“That’s exactly it. They knew you were too smart, and you would have been valedictorian, and they want a Kook as a valedictorian.” JJ says, waving his hands around as if he's describing a conspiracy theory. Hell, maybe he is describing a conspiracy theory. 

“Cassidy’s as smart as I am, she’s definitely going to be valedictorian.” Pope says, scoffing and rolling his eyes. JJ shrugs at the comment, and John B leans forward on the table.

“Clearly, they don’t agree with you on that front.” John B says, drumming his hands on the table. "If they thought Cassidy could be valedictorian, they wouldn't have chosen her." It's kind of a silly theory, but not completely ridiculous. And, hey, if the theory helps cheer up Pope, the two boys are more than willing to dive deep into it.

“If they were as intimidated by Cassidy as they were by you, they wouldn’t have chosen her.” JJ says seriously, and Pope cracks a tiny smile at the implication.

“I didn’t intimidate the Kooks.” Pope says, rolling his eyes and swatting at JJ while disagrees.

“Hell yeah, you did! Man, you went in there knowing exactly what you want to do with your life, talking about dead people and shit -”

“Language, Maybank!” Mrs. Heyward yells from the kitchen.

“Sorry, Mama Heyward! Pope, you went in there and they knew you couldn’t be beat, so they rigged the system. It’s what the Kooks do, man. You gotta see that.” JJ finishes, and Pope sighs. 

“I don’t know.” Pope says, turning away from JJ to look at John B. 

“I do. I know that.” John B says when Pope looks at him. He points to JJ. “JJ’s telling you the truth, man.” Pope seems to accept what they are saying - or, at least, comes to the conclusion that he won't change their mind - because he starts nodding as the boys talk. He's silent for a second before he responds.

“It just sucks, you know? It could have changed my life to go to the Academy.” Pope doesn't notice his mom exiting the kitchen behind him as he talks. 

“Honey, you are gonna have so many more opportunities to change your life. You’re fourteen, Pope. High school won’t define you forever, baby.” Mrs. Heyward says, cutting into the conversation and placing a plate full of chocolate chip cookies in front of the boys. While John B and JJ descend on the pile of cookies like hungry dogs, Mrs. Heyward looks at Pope. “There will be other chances. Heck, there will be other scholarships. I know it hurts now, but you can't let those Figure Eight folks get you down.” She says, patting his shoulder.

“Amen!” JJ says, through a mouth full of cookie. 

“Plus, you get to go to high school with us!” John B says, smiling as he steals Pope’s glass of milk to dunk his cookie in. Pope smiles at that one, and Mrs. Heyward scoffs as she turns back to the kitchen. She may act like the boys are a burden, but secretly, she’s happy Pope has friends like John B and JJ. 

“Please don’t remind me about the fact that I lost my one chance to get away from you guys.” Pope says, but he’s smiling. He reaches for a cookie, and then he freezes when he realizes someone’s missing. He can’t believe it took him that long to notice. “Guys, where is Kie?”

John B looks at JJ, who sighs. While the two of them were running through Pope’s neighborhood, JJ explained that he told Kiara to stay at the school, and John B had said, in no uncertain terms, that it was a stupid decision. 

“I, uh, told her to stay at the school. I didn’t know if it would be a good idea … “ JJ starts, and then he shrugs. Pope seems to catch his drift, seems to understand JJ's motivation behind excluding Kiara. It's not often the JJ tries to exclude any of the Pogues from anything, so Pope's impressed the JJ thought ahead enough to try and curtail whatever fight they may have gotten in. 

“You didn’t know if it would be a good idea for the two of us to be in the same room.” Pope says, and JJ nods, biting off another piece of cookie.

“She’s gonna be ripped shit at me -”

“ _Language,_ Maybank!” Mrs. Heyward yells from the kitchen.

“Sorry, Mama Heyward! But she’ll be fine. She’s just worried about you.” JJ says, pointing the rest of his half eaten cookie at Pope. Pope contemplates JJ's words for a second, and then nods. 

“You’re smarter than you want people to know, JJ.” Pope says in response, and JJ cringes like Pope just insulted him.

“Jesus, Pope. You can’t say that - people will expect things from me!” JJ says, and Pope laughs. JJ thinks things might be alright.

  
  


When she’s dismissed from her homeroom, Kiara breaks into JJ, John B, and Pope’s lockers and grabs their backpack. She doesn’t really know what they need - it’s the end of school, there’s only a few days left. John B’s locker is a desperate mess - Kiara doesn’t even want to touch anything in it. She’s pretty sure there’s a rotten banana in there somewhere - at least, it smells like there is. JJ’s lock is basically empty. JJ carries all his stuff in his backpack, and he hides all of his books around his classrooms so he doesn’t have to carry them. Pope’s locker is filled with every book, notebook, and folder Kiara can imagine. She can’t choose what Pope will need, so she just grabs his backpack and the first three notebooks on the top shelf of his locker, shoving them in his backpack. Hopefully it’ll be enough. 

No one stops the little girl with four backpacks on her way to the Chateau. 

No one shows up at the Chateau before her training shift at the Wreck. She texted the group chat and both JJ and John B separately, but no one responded to her. She knows they know she won’t be at the Chateau forever - her dad has taken to scheduling her for one training shift at the Wreck every week, and the boys all know that her training shift starts at 4:00 every Friday. Kiara knows they are trying to avoid her.

At 3:30, she leaves their backpacks on the screen porch and marches her way to the restaurant, pissed off and devastated at the same time. 

She gets to the Wreck with plenty of time to spare, and she throws on her apron to help her dad prep veggies in the back kitchen. It’s going well enough - she’s pretty good with a knife, and the repetition of the process of cutting onions is comforting. Mike notices that she’s a little quiet, if anything, but otherwise she’s doing okay.

It’s all going well and good until 20 minutes into the effort, when Mike says something that is just a little bit too harsh. It’s not even a big deal - he just mentions that Kiara’s onion slicing is too thick. But it’s enough to send Kiara over the edge, and she bursts into tears, and Mike starts panicking. Kiara’s not a big crier, and he immediately thinks she cut herself on the knife or something. He demands to know what’s wrong, which only makes her cry harder.

Mike can’t seem to calm her down enough to understand what happened - he gets the words _scholarship_ and _friends_ and _the t-shirt company,_ but not much else - but it doesn’t look like she hurt herself. He sighs deeply, hands her a glass of iced tea, and tells her to take a break on the back stairs until she feels a little better. Kiara takes the iced tea and scurries to the back door of the kitchen. 

She sits outside, hanging her legs off the edge of the landing, looking out onto the bay. She sips her iced tea slowly, focusing on slowing her breathing and not thinking about the inevitable doom of her favorite relationships and the fact that Pope probably hates her. In her mind, the only reason JJ wouldn’t want her to go with them is if Pope hadn’t wanted her there. She knows how much the scholarship meant to Pope, and she can sense that Pope resents the fact that she gets to go to the Academy, regardless of the fact that she doesn’t want to and isn’t planning on using it to get into a top-tier college. She knows all these things, and she knows it would have all gone away if Pope got the scholarship. But now Pope has to watch her go to the Academy everyday, a constant reminder of the scholarship he lost and the money his family doesn’t have. She’ll be a living, breathing reminder of the system that continues to fuck him and his friends over. She doesn’t know how their friendship will stand it. 

She’s spiraling in this thought process when JJ finds her. He showed up at the Wreck about a half hour after her shift started, and when he saw Mike, he cautiously approached the man. 

“Um, Mr. Carrera? I know Kiara’s working, but could I talk to her for a minute?” JJ says when he catches Mike on his way back to the kitchen. Mike sighs loudly at the kid, contemplating his options. He’s not as biased as Anna towards the Cut because he grew up there, and he had friends like JJ back in school. Even so, he doesn’t want Kiara to have friends like JJ. 

But Kiara bursting into tears in the kitchen over seemingly nothing is kind of terrifying him, and he’d bet his last customer that JJ knows what happened.

“Look, kid, let’s make a deal.” Mike says, and JJ gulps. “I’ll tell you where Kiara is, and I’ll let her have the rest of the night off, if you answer one question for me. Do we got a deal?”

“Yes, sir.” JJ says, holding out his hand for Mike to shake. JJ’s face is serious, and Mike smiles a little as he shakes the kid’s hand. 

“Alright, I need you to tell me one thing. Kiara came in here fine, and then she started crying in the kitchen for no reason. Do you know why she was crying?” Mike says, and JJ shifts on his feet. He still doesn’t really trust anyone's parents, but he thinks it might be safe to tell Mike. 

“She’s probably upset cause Pope lost the scholarship. It’s what I wanted to talk to her about.” JJ says, and Mike sighs and hangs his head. He knew about Pope’s scholarship, Kiara had mentioned it a few times. He, unlike Anna, felt like Pope attending the Academy with Kiara would be a great thing. Pope was smart and one of Kiara’s closest friends. When Kiara thought Pope was going to the Academy, she hadn’t fought them on the prospect of attending. Personally, it’s a loss for the Carreras, but Mike is also disappointed that the kid doesn’t have an opportunity like that.

“Damn. Shame that kid won’t be going to Kildare Coast.” Mike says, and then he stands up, ready to move on to his next task. “Alright, kid, she’s out back on the steps. Tell her she’s off the hook for the rest of her shift.” JJ nods at Mike, thanking him profusely, before running through the kitchen and out the backdoor of the restaurant. Mike smiles at the kid, and he thinks that maybe, sometimes, he might be too harsh on his little girl’s friends.

  
  


When the back door to the kitchen swings open, Kiara expects to see her dad asking her to come back inside and finish the onions. Instead, she sees JJ Maybank standing in the fluorescent glow of the kitchen lights. 

Kiara’s eyes harden when she sees JJ. Mike told him she had been crying in the restaurant, and JJ can see the remnants of it on her face - the red eyes and tear tracks on her face. 

“What do you want?” She asks sharply, and JJ ignores the bite to her words. Honestly, he deserves a little bit of bite. He was pretty harsh back at the school, and he recognizes it. He also knows it was what he had to do to keep Kiara at school while Pope was still raw from his lost scholarship. He knows putting an overly emotional Pope and an overly emotional Kiara in a room together under these circumstances would have been a powder keg, and he was not about to let either of them spark a match. He made a decision to keep Kiara at the school, and he has to deal with the aftermath of his decision.

JJ points behind him into the restaurant. “Your dad told me where to find you. He also said you have the rest of your shift off.” JJ says, trying to keep his voice light so Kiara will stay calm. Him and John B managed to calm down Pope, but he’s on his own with Kiara. 

Kiara turns around so she’s no longer looking at him and shakes her head. “Bullshit. He didn’t say that.” 

“You can ask him.” JJ says, shrugging. 

  
  
  
  


JJ and Kiara take the long way home to the Chateau after Mike confirms that Kiara has the rest of the day off. After they left the Wreck, the silence bordering on awkward, JJ told Kiara that John B and Pope were at Pope’s house playing video games, but he wanted to go and sit on the hammock. He words it carefully - if he says something like ‘ _I wanted to check on you’,_ Kiara will feel like JJ’s there out of guilt and not because he actually wants to be there. It’s a tricky line to walk right now, but it’s a line he drew himself.

Kiara’s still kind of spiraling. JJ showing up to the Wreck has quelled a little bit of her fear, but it’s also raised a million other questions. Like why Pope and John B aren’t with him. She’s teetering on the edge of tears again, because Pope might hate her and John B might side with him and JJ might be here to tell her how they feel. 

She’s never felt so left out of the Pogues.

But she also doesn’t want to go home, she doesn’t want to face her mother’s questions about why she isn’t at The Wreck and why her emotions _are_ a wreck. The Chateau might be empty, but it’s more comforting than home right now and she’s desperate and terrified to figure out what the boys are thinking. She can usually read them so well, especially JJ, but her head’s spinning too much for her to understand anything. 

They don’t talk much until they hit the sand, and Kiara takes her sneakers off, holding them in one hand as she splashes in the cold, shallow water. 

“I’m sorry I’m keeping you from your video games.” Kiara says quietly, and JJ scoffs. He’s a few feet away, his hands stuffed deep in his pockets, trying not to be awkward. He’s dealt with Kiara a lot - he’s seen her at her most fierce, her angriest, her most scared - but he’s never dealt with Kiara when he was the one who hurt her. Sure, they’ve gotten into fights - the Wednesday Tutoring Session mishap and the surfing accident among them - but he’s never been the person who’s directly said something that hurt her. He’s always dealt with Sad Kiara when there was someone else to blame - someone else at fault, someone else to direct his anger at. He’s doesn’t know how to act when the blame is shifted to him. 

“You really think I would be here if I didn’t want to be?” JJ says, hoping to get his point across. It’s not that he’s missing video games, or that he wants to sit in the hammock, or even necessarily that he wants to talk to Kiara about her sad feels. He just can’t leave her alone when he knows he hurt her feelings. 

After a couple of hours of video games, Pope had mostly recovered from his disappointment. They had finished a particularly difficult mission on the new Spiderman video game when Pope had said someone should find Kiara and make sure she was alright. JJ was up and out of his seat before Pope finished his sentence. He wanted to make sure Pope was okay, but once it seemed like Pope was stable enough, JJ had been chomping at the bit to get out of the house and find Kiara. He doesn’t know if his words convey this to Kiara, because she just shrugs.

“I don’t want you to blame me for dragging you away from Fortnite.” Kiara says, her voice clipped, and JJ sighs. He can’t deal with this - with hurting Kiara, with a devastated Pope, with all the things that are happening right now. It’s too much. 

“Could never blame you for that.” JJ says, hoping to go for light and teasing, and Kiara looks down at her bare feet in the water. JJ switches between running his hand through his hair and putting his hands into his pockets. He doesn’t know how to stop fidgeting. 

“But Pope blames me.” She says, her voice small, her shoulders caving in as if she wants to fold into herself. This is exactly why he didn’t want Kiara and Pope in the same room - Kiara would feel just guilty enough that she would assume Pope would blame her, and Pope would be too emotional to tell her anything else, and it would dissolve into a fight when neither side blamed the other one. JJ knows Pope sometimes says things in fights that he doesn’t mean - Kiara and Pope don’t fight often, but when they do, their words are cutting. He knew that today, more than any day, the Pogues couldn’t afford cutting. A defensive Kiara and a devastated Pope was not a good mix.

“No, Kie, that’s ridiculous - “ JJ starts, trying to figure out a way to word his thoughts so he doesn’t start a fight with Kiara. He doesn’t find a way before Kiara is laughing humorlessly and shaking her head. 

“Then he’s pissed at me, even if he doesn’t blame me!” She says, her voice a little stronger but just as sad. There’s no polite way to word ‘ _he’s not mad but even seeing you would be a reminder that he lost out on a huge opportunity for his future, so it’s better that you aren’t there_ ’.

“He’s not pissed at you!” JJ says instead, and it’s clearly the wrong wording of the sentiment, because Kiara whirls around to look at him.

“Then why did you tell me to stay at the school? Why did you abandon me at the Chateau? Why are you the only one here right now?” She says, poking her finger at JJ to emphasize her words. JJ’s startled, trying to come up with an answer to all Kie’s questions. 

“Pope just needs time!” JJ says, and Kiara scoffs, turning away from him. As she starts walking along the beach again, tears are brimming in her eyes.

“Is this the end of the Pogues?” Kiara says quietly after a moment, and JJ stops in his tracks.

“Kie, what the _fuck_?” He says, completely flabbergasted by the statement. _The end of the Pogues?_ What does Kiara think is going on?

“Is this, like, a friend break up? Like, do Pope and John B not want me because I’m going to the Kook school alone?” Kiara stops walking a few feet from JJ, and turns to look out on the water.

“Kie, I’m gonna ask you again: what the fuck are you talking about? This isn’t a friend break up - Jesus, Kie, I’m trying to apologize for being a dick at school, not dump you.” JJ says, and Kiara shrugs. 

“I don’t know, JJ, it just feels like … “ Kiara says, trailing off, tugging her hair behind her ears. 

“Feels like what?” JJ says, cause he’s floored. A friend break up? Is that even allowed? Jesus Christ, he’s gonna need to sleep off the emotional turmoil of today for three weeks. 

“You guys don’t want me anymore.” Kiara says, wiping at her eyes with the sleeve of her shirt. JJ’s head feels like it’s going to pop off.

“ _Don’t want you anymore -_ Kie, what are you even saying?” JJ didn’t know what was going on in Kiara’s head, but if this is any indication, it’s a good thing he didn’t bring her to Pope’s. Clearly, there’s something more going on here.

“I’m saying that the three of you ran out of school without me today, left me in the dark for hours, and now you show up randomly without either of them. I’m saying you don’t think I’m Pogue enough to deal with this shit.” Kiara says, gesturing wildly with her hands and trying to avoid crying. JJ blinks in shock.

“Kie, that’s not true. That’s way overdramatic - ” 

“I’m not being overdramatic! You didn’t want me there today because I’m an outsider.” Kiara says, flinging her arms open, and staring at JJ. JJ knows this look, he’s seen it before - she’s looking for a fight. She’s inviting JJ to try and fight her, and she knows she’ll win. 

Well, she can’t fight him if he forfeits.

“Kiara, stop trying to fight with me.” JJ says sternly, and Kiara’s shows just a little bit of shock. “I’m not gonna do this shit - you are a Pogue, of course we want you, you are one of us through and through. John B and I went with Pope to calm him down, I didn’t want you there because I knew Pope was going to be angry and I was scared he was going to say something mean to you that wouldn’t help the situation, and then you guys would fight, and we have been through enough today and didn’t need it. John B and Pope didn’t have anything to do with that decision - I had to explain to them that you weren’t coming because I told you not to. John B and Pope are at Pope’s house playing video games because Pope had a shitty day and that’s what he wanted to do. I’m here because he’s not the only one who had a shitty day.” 

Kiara crumples into the sand as JJ finishes his speech. She doesn’t move far enough up the sand to avoid the water, just plops down in the damp sand. She doesn’t even care that her ass is getting wet. 

“I’m sorry, JJ.” She says, wiping at her eyes as JJ takes a deep breath and goes to sit next to her. “I know this isn’t about me…” She says trailing off.

“But?” JJ prompts as he sits down. He doesn’t show it, but he’s ecstatic that she’s apologizing and explaining it to him - he’s convinced he made the right decision not having her follow him to Pope’s, even if they got in a fight. 

“But it feels like it might be.” Kiara says, and JJ’s quiet as he gives her a chance to explain herself. “When Pope was going to the Academy, it felt like I could be a Pogue and go to a Kook school and not worry about how anyone felt about me, cause Pope would be there. But now… I don’t know, are you still gonna wanna hang out with me when I’m at the Academy?”

“Duh” Is all JJ says, and Kiara nearly smiles.

“No, I mean, seriously. You had to stay friends with me if Pope went, because you couldn’t drop both of us. But now I’m alone and I don’t really belong anywhere and it sucks.” Kies looking down at her wrist, tugging at one of the bracelets that adorns her arm. The yellow one.

“You belong with the Pogues, Kie.” JJ says, as he holds out his wrist in front of her and tugs on the matching yellow bracelet he's worn everyday since 5th grade. It's old and dirty, but JJ wouldn't ever take it off. Kiara sighs at the sight of it. 

“JJ - “

“No, shut up. No argument. You are a Pogue, Kie, that’s where you belong. There’s no identity crisis here, there’s no outcasts. You are one of us, and it doesn’t matter if you go to the Academy or Kildare High or if you move halfway across the country to go to a different school. You are a Pogue. You started the Pogues.” He pauses for a minute. “The Pogues are nothing without Kiara.”

Kiara doesn’t seem to accept that - she looks so dejected, like she’s beating herself up for being sad at the same time as mourning the loss of the scholarship. JJ’s not great with emotions like this, and he’s not sure how to deal with it. He opens his mouth to say something reassuring, or moderately uplifting, but instead he just pours out his own guilt.

“I think John B and I jinxed the scholarship.” JJ says, and he ignores Kiara as she opens her mouth to say something and just keeps talking. “We talked, last week, about what would happen if Pope lost the scholarship, and we both admitted we would rather have both of you at Kildare High. I didn’t mean to cost Pope his scholarship.” JJ admits, feeling the guilt settle in his stomach. 

“JJ, stop. That’s ridiculous, you didn’t cause Pope to lose his scholarship, it was -” Kiara says, and JJ shakes his head, cutting her off. 

“Don’t you believe in karma? Manifesting shit, or whatever?” JJ says, and Kiara’s silent for a second before nodding. “Isn’t that how it works? I manifested Pope and Kiara going to Kildare High. My manifestation is only strong enough to work halfway.”

“Stop it, JJ.” Kiara says, thinking he must be joking. JJ constantly teases her about crystal and manifestation and “ _hippie crap”_ , so she’s having a hard time believing he’s raking himself over the coals by that logic. “Manifestation and karma are serious -” 

“I’m being serious!” JJ says, harsher than he intends to, and Kiara’s quiet for a moment. She’s stunned by his words - not because they are harsh, but because JJ actually blames himself for Pope losing the scholarship.

“JJ, that’s not how it works. You didn’t ruin Pope’s chances.” Kiara tries to explain. She doesn’t know how to tell JJ that’s impossible, that there were clearly other players at work in this disaster. 

“I don’t believe you.” JJ says quieter, and Kiara scoffs. 

“It doesn’t matter if you _believe me_ or not. It’s the truth.” Kiara says, and that causes JJ to crack a small smile. She doesn’t know how this got turned around - Kiara worrying about her place in the Pogues to Kiara comforting JJ - but she’s almost glad it did. If JJ’s explaining his emotions to her, even just a little bit, it means that things are still kind of normal. JJ won’t talk about his emotions to anyone, but once in a while he lets the Pogues know what’s going on in his brain. If he’s talking to her about this, it means he’s telling her the truth when he says she’s still a Pogue. 

“Don’t you, like, not believe in objective truth or whatever? _There’s no right answer, Kie, it’s just how your heart feels, or some shit like that_?” JJ says, holding his hands in front of him in prayer position, his voice mimicking the youtuber Kiara likes to watch when she does yoga on the beach. Kiara uses both her hands to shove him so he almost tips over into the sand, and JJ breaks into a full smile.

“I believe in objective truth, and I know one objective truth off the top of my head: you did not ruin Pope’s scholarship, JJ.” Kiara says firmly once JJ rights himself. JJ nods at her lightly, his smile fading slightly. Kiara knows he doesn’t really believe her, because he’s the most self-deprecating human she knows, but maybe if she says it enough, he’ll believe it. 

“I lied.” Kiara says, after a second, and JJ looks up at her quickly. “I know one more objective truth: next year is going to blow.” 

“Maybe you can convince your parents not to make you go.” JJ says half heartedly, not expecting Kiara to actually jump at the opportunity. He intends it as a joke - _see, I kept Pope out of the Academy, maybe I can keep you out too! Haha!_

But Kiara doesn’t take it that way.

“That’s exactly it!” She says, jumping up from the sand and turning towards JJ. “I’m gonna convince my parents I can’t go to the Academy!” 

JJ’s mind starts spinning. “No, Jesus, Kie. We literally just talked about this, I can not manifest a shitty future for you too, this is -”

“I’ll tell them how Pope didn’t get the scholarship and all signs point to it being about his race and they’ll have to let me go to Kildare High! I mean, I’m half-black! They can’t force me to go to a racist school!” Kiara says, barely paying attention to what JJ is saying.

JJ blinks for a second, and suddenly, he sees everything Kiara sees. He sees how she’s looking at the scholarship, about the one thing Pope didn’t have that Cassidy did. He gulps at the realization. It’s not that he doesn’t talk about race - he’s friends with Kiara, who’s on her own personal mission to redress all grievances with the Powers That Be. He’s talked with her, and sometimes with Pope as well, about their experiences with race and how it affects them, and Kiara’s told him how he could be a better ally. 

He still has trouble seeing it sometimes. Even though he’s poor - poorer than basically anyone else on the island - he’s never, ever had to worry about the color of his skin and the way people perceive him because of it. Even though he tries his best to be a good friend and ally to both Kiara and Pope, he’s slow to realize how bad things can actually be. But it makes sense, now that he thinks about it.

Kiara turns to look at him as his head continues to spin. “The Academy is my shitty future, JJ! You didn’t manifest this, but maybe you have a point.” She says, and she’s crossing her arms like she just made a point. “Maybe the happy ending is all of us at Kildare High.” 

JJ can’t wrap his head around any of it - he’s trying to figure out the perfect thing to say, the best way to respond, but he doesn’t find it. Instead, he asks “Kiara, how in the world is the happy ending going to the shittier school?”

“How in the world is the happy ending going to the racist school?” She shoots back as quickly as she can, and JJ doesn’t have a come back for that one.

“I guess - I mean…. Jesus, Kie, I don’t know.” He stumbles, trying to find words he doesn’t have. He promises that next time, he’ll be more perspective to these things. Kiara looks at him. “You have a point, Kie. I see what you’re saying, and I believe you. It’s just - your future, Kie.”

“My future will be fine.” Kiara says, finally, and JJ just nods at her. 

  
  
  


Kie’s right - the scholarship thing doesn’t sit right with JJ. He also knows, in his heart, that even his strongest manifestation couldn’t change the minds of the rich assholes at the Academy. He doesn't tell John B or Pope what they talked about on the beach, but by the time Kiara shows up at the Chateau the next day, it's like nothing happened. Kiara hugs Pope, and she asks how he's doing, and then they take their boards out and it's like everything is right in world. When JJ asks Kiara if she talked to her parents, she just smirks and tells him she has a plan.

Selfishly, the prospect of having both Kiara and Pope in school with him makes high school sound less daunting, and the thought of going to Kildare High makes Kiara smile so wide, JJ can’t help but agree with her.

Her parents, however, have no problems disagreeing with her. Kie spends the next few weeks battling her parents on every front - she even makes a PowerPoint presentation about the inequity of the Academy, the problematic structure, it’s less than stellar record with race, sex, and disability discrimination. Her parents barely budge. 

But they do - a little. One night at dinner, when Kie slaps an article about a student who was bullied at the Academy and was suing the school for lack of action, her parents seem to soften. Kie’s not sure if it’s because the expenses of the school look far nicer in their bank accounts, or if they are finally listening to her arguments, or if they understand that Kie really, really doesn’t want to go, but they don’t shut her down right away. They talk to her about her worries, and they don’t yell at each other, and at the end of dinner, they don’t say “ _you’re going, get over it_ ” like they have every other night. Kie doesn’t know what changes, but she doesn’t care. She’s beaming, because her parents are _finally_ seeing her side. This is good. 

That night, Kie’s dad comes into her room and tells her that they are going to be discussing the academy with less certainty. He tells her that he understands where she’s coming from, and he wants the best for her. He asks her not to bring it up at dinner for a few days so the two of them can discuss it. Kie agrees, and she could cry happy tears. 

She hears her parents discussing it that night, her mother talking to her father about the opportunities at the academy and the doors it will open. 

“Mike, you can’t tell me she’ll get the same opportunities at Kildare High.” Anna says. “We agreed that she would go to the private school freshman year - this could change her life.”

“I know you want what’s best for her. I do too. But Anna, you don’t get it.” Her dad says.

“Don’t get what?” Her mom’s voice is incredulous. 

“You don’t get what it’s like to be like us. I’m black. Kiara is black. The two of us are going to experience life very differently from you.” Her dad says calmly, and Kiara’s mom is quiet for a minute. Kiara wants to cry and jump up and down at the same time. It’s a sad reality, but at least her dad understands it. 

“So, you think she shouldn’t go?” Her mother says again, in a voice so quiet Kiara almost can’t hear it. 

“I didn’t say that. I’m just saying, we need to think about it.” Her dad says, and Kiara breathes deeply. Her dad is on her side, she can tell. She’s going to be fine. She’s going to be with her boys next year. 

Kiara doesn’t tell the other pogues about the breakthrough with her dad. She feels like speaking it outloud would jinx it - it’s a little backwards, given the fact that she told JJ that he didn’t jinx Pope’s scholarship. Even if she doesn’t really believe in jinx-ing things, she doesn’t want to test it. She can keep this little bit of good news to herself for a couple weeks. It’ll be fine.

Instead, she goes about her day normally with the boys - helping out a little at The Wreck, surfing in the afternoon, and then sitting around a bonfire at the Chateau at night. It’s becoming one of those summers that she thinks is perfect - every sweatshirt she owns smells like a campfire, every bathing suit of hers has been worn, and she’s even making a little money. Everything is going great. 

Until it isn’t. 

The first real altercation with the Kooks comes on a breezy day that summer. The air in the Outer Banks is usually hot and stuffy, the humidity unbearable this late in the summer, but Mother Nature decided to be merciful that day. The sky was overcast, the sun blocked by a thick layer of clouds, but the threat of rain didn’t seem to be looming. The breeze off the water felt cool and comfortable after weeks of ninety degree weather. Kiara demanded to eat lunch on the beach, because the Wreck is nice but lunch with the waves in front of her is nicer. She guilts her dad into helping her make a couple of burgers for the boys before she sends off a text letting them know she’s got food on her mind. She adds in a promise of surfing later, after lunch, for good measure. She doesn’t need to check her messages to see if they are going to show up - free food and the promise of maybe surfing is enough to get even John B out of bed.

Predictably, it takes the boys about 10 minutes to get to the Wreck once Kiara sends out the message. When the boys arrive at the Wreck, ready to eat their weight in fries, Kiara’s still in the back, finishing grilling the burgers with her dad. With a little bit of emotional manipulation on Kiara’s side, she also gets two jugs of iced tea and a couple of bags of chips.

They leave the wreck, juggling take out bags and jugs of iced tea. They must look like they are having too much fun, because when Rafe Cameron spots them from across the street, he can’t keep his mouth shut. 

When Rafe catcalls Kiara, all of the Pogues freeze. He yells something at her, something so obscene and derogatory that Kiara isn't even entirely sure what it means. She's in eighth grade, and her vocabulary has evolved to include a litany of swear words, but she's unfamiliar with this particular phrase. She can tell, from Rafe's laughter, that it is meant to embarrass her. She can also tell, from the way that John B and JJ tense up, that they understand more about what Rafe is saying than she does.

Kiara opens her mouth to tell the boys that it doesn’t matter, that the Kooks aren’t worth it, that they can still go on their merry way and eat on the beach. She knows Rafe and his friends are in High School, and the Cameron’s are the most powerful family on the island. She’s not one to back down from a fight, but this one doesn’t seem worth it. 

But she doesn’t get a word out until John B and JJ are already across the street, the food and iced tea they were carrying abandoned on the sidewalk. Her and Pope follow them a split second later, trying to stop the fight that has already broken out. JJ and John B, even though they are years younger, are holding their own against Rafe and his high school friends, but Kiara doesn’t know how much longer that will last. Pope’s trying to pull them out of the fight, drag them back across the street. Kiara’s yelling that it doesn’t matter, that they need to leave before something bad happens, but the boys aren’t listening. 

It doesn’t end until Officer Shoupe stops it. He was nearby patrolling when he saw that Maybank kid run across the street and punch Rafe Cameron completely unprovoked. 

“What is going on here?” Shoupe says loudly, pulling a still flailing JJ off of Rafe. He gives a good shove to JJ, sending him flying back to where the rest of the Pogues are standing. Kiara catches JJ before he falls over, righting him as they look at Shoupe. No one says anything for a second. 

“Rafe?” Shoupe says, looking at the boy, and Rafe points at the Pogues. He looks innocent, his face portraying every level of confusion to Shoupe.

“I don’t know Officer, I was walking down the street and these hooligans attacked me.” Rafe says, and Kiara takes a step forward, her eyes raging with anger.

“That is not true! He called us names - “ Kiara says, but when Shoupe turns to look at her, she falters. The anger is quickly replaced with fear, and she takes a half step back. 

When Kiara falters, JJ steps in between her and Shoupe. “Officer, he started it -” JJ says, but Rafe scoffs and cuts him off.

“That’s ridiculous. Officer Shoupe, JJ threw the first punch.” Rafe says. The look on Rafe's face is so condescending, so entitled, that JJ is seeing red. He can't believe this asshole thinks he can get away with whatever he wants just because he's rich. 

“Because you catcalled Kiara!” JJ yells, and Rafe’s eyes narrow as he looks at the kid. It's a promise of what would happen if a police officer wasn't standing between them. JJ wants to invite Rafe to deliver the next punch anyways. 

“I wouldn’t do that, Officer. I was taught to respect women.” Rafe says, and Kiara wants to gag. She can’t believe Shoupe is listening to this piece of shit.

“JJ, did you throw the first punch?” Shoupe asks, turning to the Pogues.

“Yes, but -” JJ starts, but John B cuts him off.

“I did, Shoupe. I threw the first punch.” John B says, and Shoupe runs a hand over his face.

“Alright, kids, here’s what’s going to happen. Rafe, you and your buddies are going to go home, you hear?” Shoupe says, and Rafe and his friends nod before Shoupe waves them off. “You guys are gonna come with me to the station, and I’m going to have your parents pick you up.” 

“What? That’s ridiculous! Why does Rafe get to go home?” Kiara says, trying to step in front of JJ to get in Shoupe’s face, but JJ grabs her arm and stops her so he’s still a human barrier between her and the police officer. 

“Look, Kiara, he didn’t throw the first punch, and I don’t think Rafe Cameron said something like that.” Shoupe says, and Kiara glares at him. “You’re lucky I’m not writing your friends up.” 

  
  
  


When Shoupe brings the kids into the station, Sheriff Peterkin gives him a hard time for letting “ _the damn Cameron kid”_ go. 

“You can’t let the Cameron kid go, but drag in the kids from the Cut.” She says to him when Shoupe explains the situation. “We’re supposed to deal in justice here, Shoupe, not favoritism.” 

Shoupe just reiterates the story. Peterkin sighs. She can’t do anything to redress the situation now - not without causing an uproar with the Figure Eight folks. And she has to call the Pogue's parents, because they are minors. She doesn’t want to, but her hands are tied. 

“Don’t pull this again, Shoupe. You bring in all responsible parties from now on.” Peterkin says, and Shoupe nods. “Call their parents, get them picked up. They aren’t in any trouble.” 

  
  


Big John is at best unamused by John B’s antics. Heyward grounds Pope for months before he even leaves the station. JJ’s dad calls him a piece of shit as they get into his truck, and JJ spends most of the rest of night praying the lock on his door will hold. 

Kiara’s parents are a different story altogether. The Carrera’s show up first to the station, in as over-dramatic a manner as Kiara can imagine. Anna is nearly hysterical, crying her eyes out and demanding “ _where is my daughter?!”_ Mike is less hysterical, his demeanor remaining calm but his eyes hard. When he sees Kiara, she sees the disappointment in them.

Kiara reluctantly follows her parents out of the station, and it’s silent on the car ride home except for her mom’s sniffles. 

When she gets home, the fighting starts. Her parents tell her she’s not allowed to hang out with the Pogues - especially JJ - ever again. ‘ _If you hang out with trash, you're going to get dirty’_ her dad says. It’s not the last time she hears that. 

She uses every argument in her arsenal to get her parents to back down. She tells them what actually happened - what Rafe said, how the boys reacted. She tells them that JJ was a human shield between her and any potential danger. They refuse to listen to her. All her mom can focus on is the fact that Kiara’s friend punched _Ward Cameron’s son,_ and all her dad can focus on is the fact that Kiara got herself into a police station. It’s not pretty. 

In the end, she gets her phone taken away, some extra shifts at The Wreck, and she’s grounded for two weeks. They try to tell her she’s not allowed to be friends with the Pogues, but she nearly riots whenever they say that. They blame JJ and John B and Pope - anyone who isn’t a Figure Eight bachelor - no matter what she says, and no matter what they say, she’s adamant they can’t dictate her friendships. She’ll live without her phone and her free time but she will not - _will not -_ live without her friends. It’s unthinkable. 

It’s an argument that goes well into the night, and then Mike and Anna play the last card they have in their deck. If Kiara is insistent that she’s going to stay friends with the boys, there’s one last thing they can do to try and introduce her to people that won’t drag her into danger.

By the next morning, Kiara’s enrolled at the Academy for the fall semester and there is nothing she can do about it.


	6. If There's A Hell, It Might Be The Van Der Worker's Diner Party

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First of all, I’ve been listening to Taylor Swift’s new album on repeat, so I’m way In My Feels. Bear with me. The fact that my folklore binge-ing coincides with Kiara being a Big Emotional Disaster in this and subsequent chapters is completely unplanned. Seriously. 
> 
> Also, there were two things I forgot to mention last chapter in my author's note:
> 
> 1.) Thank you so much to aleksandrale123 for helping me figure out a name for the Kook Academy!! I was struggling with it for weeks, so your comment really helped me out :)
> 
> 2.) I'm so excited that there’s gonna be a season 2 of this show!! Ahh I literally can not wait!

Kiara’s parents don’t budge on the whole “ _pogues are the enemies_ ” thing. For three days, she has no contact with any of them. She can’t even walk herself to the Wreck - her dad drives her everywhere, because both her parents know she’d run straight to the Chateau given the chance. On top of her chores and her work hours, her parents also have insanely strict rules about communication with the outside world - she can’t use her phone or her laptop to check in on her friends. She’s fairly certain they wouldn’t even let her send a carrier pigeon if she had access to one. 

She spends her days prepping veg and moping in her bedroom until, one night, after a long shift at the Wreck, Mike answers the door to find John Booker Routledge on his front porch. John B’s standing there, trying to act as tough as any eighth-grader-almost-high-schooler can, but he’s still visibly nervous. It’s almost enough for Mike to take pity on him. 

Almost. 

“What do you want?” Mike says after he stares for a minute at John B and he doesn’t run away. John Brocks on his feet, trying to decide what exactly he wants.

It’s been a rough couple of days for all the Pogues. His dad had been particularly gruff, especially without Pope or Kiara to act as an emotional barrier. It seems to John B like the older he gets, the less him and his dad get along. When he was in middle school, it used to be enough to sit on the couch with Big John and JJ, drink hot chocolate, and watch _Cheers._ But now, as he’s about to enter high school, he finds that him and his dad are more at odds about things - now that John B is starting to realize that his dad is spending all of their money on a hopeless quest to find a pot of gold. Since John B has started working on a few of the Kook family’s boats around the island, he’s realizing just how much of his dad’s money is going to searching for the Royal Merchant. They weren’t ever going to live on Figure Eight, but they could probably avoid the monthly panic as they tried to figure out rent if it weren’t for the new boat and fancy equipment and bi-monthly overnight boating trips Big John felt were necessary for his search. It becomes a point of contention for John B, and it’s not that he hates his dad, or would ever want to leave him but sometimes…. sometimes he understands why his mom left. Sometimes he understands why Clarise Routledge only writes to them when she moves houses. 

It’s led to some cutting fights at the Chateau, usually with JJ there. When Big John and John B start fighting, JJ will leave the house, sit on the hammock or on the dock. JJ’s basically family to both the Routledges, and they have no qualms about fighting in front of him, because there’s no charade that they have to keep up for him. 

John B and Big John both work to make sure Kiara and Pope don’t recognize the growing rift between them. JJ knows the truth, he’s seen the fights, he knows the darkest parts of this island. There’s no use in trying to hide any tension from him - he’s around so often, he can sense it as soon as he enters the Chateau. With a single look between Big John and John B, JJ can tell if they just had a fight, or if they are on the brink of another screaming match. JJ’s good at reading the signs of an incoming fight. 

Pope and Kiara, on the other hand, aren’t as privy to the worst of the worst. JJ, John B, and Big John work - sometimes together, sometimes alone - to keep the very worst from both of them. Kiara’s from Figure Eight - there are some things she will never be forced to deal with, and the three of them work to keep it that way. Even Pope, who lives on the Cut, is less than familiar with the things that keep all the Johns up at night. He has parents who love him, big aspirations for his future, and a brain brillant enough to get him there. Big John likes to keep the charade up while he can.

It’s not like this latest disaster is doing anything to help Big John and John B’s disagreements. They fought like hell the first night after they got back from the police station. Big John isn’t violent at all, but both he and John B know how to get under each other’s skin. It wasn’t a pretty arguement.

They weren’t on speaking terms when JJ showed up at their door the next day, bruises littering his body. It wasn’t like this was the first time it happened, but something about the timing of JJ’s appearance when they were fighting seemed to soften both John B and Big John to each other, and they silently agreed to forgive and forget while Big John grabbed the first aid kit and John B grabbed the ice pack. It was the same kind of silent agreement that forced John B to never talk about JJ’s home life with anyone else, or that kept any of the boys from ever mentioning the amount of food Kiara indiscreetly left around the Chateau. There are some things you just have to do to survive on the Cut. 

Which brings John B back to the original question: what did he want? Why was he at Kiara’s house? He knew from the expression on Mike’s face that Kiara was not going to be allowed to hang out any time soon. So what is he doing here?

John B takes a deep breath, and then looks at Mike. “I just want to see Kie, Mr. Carrera. Make sure she’s okay.”

It’s clearly the wrong thing to say to Mike. “Make sure she’s okay? You want to make sure Kiara’s _okay_?! Look here, John B, my daughter was in a police station _because of you._ If Kiara’s not okay, it’s because she spends time with rabble-rousers.” The sound of Mike shouting is enough to draw both Kiara and Anna downstairs to the foyer. 

“Mike, what’s going on?” Anna asks, at the same time Kiara hears John B’s voice say “Mr. Carrera, I understand why you are angry, but I just need to see her.” 

“John B!” Kiara yells, sprinting to the front door and avoiding her mother who’s trying to stop her. She sticks her head out from behind her dad, and she stretches up on her tiptoes to see John B’s face better. She misses her Pogues.

John B breathes a sigh of relief when he sees Kiara’s curly head pop up from behind her dad’s shoulder. He didn’t know what to expect, but he’s glad she’s here.

“Are you good, Kie?” John B says, as Anna tries to yell at Kiara to go to her room and Mike tries to yell at John B to get off his porch. Neither of the Pogues pay attention. 

“I’m fine.” Kiara thinks she understands the implication behind John B’s words - he’s worried that her parents are being too strict, or whatever, and he wants to know that she’s okay. She smiles at him for good measure. 

John B realizes that he came for exactly that reaction. It’s not nearly enough, but it’ll have to do for now. Kiara’s not happy, but she’s safe and healthy enough. It’s not that John B thinks the Carrera’s would ever hurt Kiara, but he’s learned not to trust adults. 

Besides, he knows the first thing JJ’s going to ask when John B gets back to the Chateau is _“did you see her?”_ He won’t care what her parents said, or what they yelled, or if they got into a fight, or even how long Kiara’s sentence is. He will want to know that John B confirmed with his own eyes that Kiara Carrera is healthy and unharmed, and the rest of it won’t really matter. If there’s any comfort John B can give JJ, it’ll be this.

A day after getting picked up from the police station, Pope started responding to his text messages. He said that his dad had him on extra grocery runs and a lot more chores, but despite his dad’s threats in the station, Pope’s sentence was relatively light. All the Pogues knew, from both prior experience and the overdramatic scene that had played out in the police station, that Kiara would not be let off easily. Her parents were by far the most strict parents in the group, and they were deeply concerned with their daughter’s social standing. A trip to the police station with three of the Cut’s most notorious middle schoolers? Not in their best interest. 

JJ and John B were trying not to worry about Kiara by the third day without any form of communication. JJ was still relegated to the couch by Big John out of an abundance of caution for his potentially bruised ribs. His potentially bruised ribs didn’t stop him from demanding things - orange juice, a peanut butter sandwich, and finally, somewhere between dinner and midnight, a demand to go and check on Kiara. 

John B agreed with JJ, if only because it seemed like something that might calm him down. It’s not like John B wasn’t worried about Kiara - he just wasn’t as worried as JJ was. Where John B figured Kiara's parents are just being super strict, JJ's mind immediately goes to a darker place, for understandable reasons. John B had promised to go over to her house the following night to make sure everything was okay. 

When John B was getting ready to set out for Kiara’s house the next night, JJ had been adamant that he was going along. Then JJ tried to get up off the couch, wincing as he sat up, and John B told him there was absolutely no way he was walking all the way to Figure Eight. As he forced JJ to lay back down, John B had promised that he would make sure Kiara was fine. And, as far as he can tell, he made good on that promise.

“I’m sorry, Mr. and Mrs. Carrera, for everything.” John B says, after he nods at Kiara. Kiara’s face falls when she realizes John B isn’t here to break her out, he’s really just here to apologize and make sure she’s okay. She wants to ask him a million questions - starting with where her other two Pogues are - but John B just turns and walks down the steps of her front porch, heading back in the direction of the Chateau. He knows the boundaries, and he knows the Carrera’s vice-like grip on Kiara’s freedom. He’s not going to stir the pot by staying any longer. He got what he was coming for, and that’s good enough for now.

Mike’s stunned by John B’s departure - he was fairly certain he would have had to call the cops to get the boy away from his daughter. Normally, the four kids are attached at the hip, and any effort to break them up is met with the utmost resistance. Maybe John B is more mature than Mike gives him credit for. 

Or maybe, all of this was some elaborate set up to try and sneak Kiara out of the house. Maybe asking if she’s okay is some kind of code word…

Mike shakes his head as he closes the front door, Kiara yelling at him that she wants to talk to John B for _just five minutes_. Mike realizes he’s being ridiculous - no eighth grader is going to concoct some wild plan to sneak out of the house.

Then he remembers the shenanigans he would have gotten up to as a fourteen year old on the Cut, and he sets all the house alarms and sleeps with a baseball bat next to his bed.

  
  
  
  


It’s another few days of torture for Kiara before her parents force her to go with them to dinner with the Van der Workers. The Van der Workers own a McMansion on Figure Eight, and their daughter Caroline is in the same grade as Kiara. The Carrera’s try to convince Kiara that she should try to make friends, because she’s going to the Academy next year. She thinks they just like to remind her of her impending doom whenever they can.

Kiara fights them initially, but by the time they arrive at the Van der Workers house, she decides she’s actually going to give Caroline a chance. She’s trying to work on not getting sucked into girl hate, and she does need a couple friends at the Kook Academy to survive. If her parents are forcing her to go to this dinner, then she can make it work for her. Who knows, if she’s on her best behavior, maybe it’ll earn her some bonus points towards getting her friends, or at least her phone, back.

Regrettably, it’s not that simple. It’s unfortunate that the Carrera’s chose to go to the Van der Workers. Perhaps it wouldn’t have ended so badly if the person Kiara was supposed to get along with was anyone other than Caroline and her friends. 

Caroline starts out by squealing and hugging Kiara as if she’s already her best friend, and then dragging her to a table filled with similar blonde haired girls that Kiara can’t even begin to tell apart. It’s fine, because Kiara’s trying to keep an open mind. They eat sitting by the pool while the parents are inside, and it’s alright cause the girls are talking about teachers they hate, boys they like, and the movie they’re going to watch at the next sleepover ( _“You are totally invited, Kiara!”_ Caroline says, and Kiara accepts the invitation). 

Kiara tells them several times to call her ‘Kie’, but they all manage to somehow ignore her and continue calling her Kiara. It shouldn’t bother Kiara, except that it’s the nickname the Pogues gave her and she likes it. She lets it go, because it’s mostly just easy. Kiara can sit back silently and soak in the names floating around her as the girls chat. She doesn’t pay much attention to the names until they are talking about Rafe Cameron. 

“He’s so hot, guys, I can’t even deal with it.” One of the girls - her name might be Tiffany - states.

“Oh my god, I know.” Says another one of the girls, the one who looks like she’s named Jessica.

“Wait -” Kiara says, hoping her ears are deceiving her. “You think Rafe Cameron is hot?” 

All eyes are on Kie as she speaks what might be her first full sentence of the night. “Uh, yes, of course. Have you seen him? Have you seen his _Jeep_?” Maybe Tiffany says, and Maybe Jessica starts gushing over his car. Kiara scrunches her nose at the thought of someone finding _Rafe Cameron_ attractive. She knows he’s rich and conventionally attractive, but everytime she looks at him, she sees him punching JJ in the street outside The Wreck. 

“To each their own, I guess.” Kiara says quietly, and Caroline laughs. 

“I know, right? I’m more into Topper, myself.” Caroline winks at her conspiratorially, but Kiara doesn’t reciprocate. 

“Oh, god, but I heard Topper’s going after Sarah!” Another girl says from across the table. Kiara’s beginning to wish she had paid attention when they had all introduced themselves, because she was almost certain that the girl's name _was_ Sarah. Or, something like that. Kiara wonders, momentarily, if it would be rude to ask them to wear name tags. The entire table bursts into chatter after the comment, but it’s Caroline’s voice who cuts through the noise. 

“He won’t get with her. She’s so desperate for attention, and she’s with Dennis anyways.” The other girls at the table react like Caroline something wise, nodding along to her words.

“Wait, who’s Sarah?” Kiara says, clearly confused. 

“Sarah Cameron.” One of the girls answers, and Kiara blinks in confusion. 

“Rafe’s sister?” She clarifies, and the table nods. “Wait, you guys don’t like her?” 

“Oh no, we love Sarah!” Caroline says, and the table is nodding in agreement. “It’s just - you have to be a little bit realistic about some stuff, you know? She’s a little bit …” Caroline’s voice trails off, and Maybe Tiffany picks up where Caroline left off. 

“She’s always with some guy, and she thinks she’s so hot. She's not hot, she's just a slut. And she’s so obnoxious about being how rich she is. Like, we get it, Sarah. We’re all well off - you don’t need to do so much.” Maybe Tiffany says, gesturing with her hands like she made some sort of point. Apparently Maybe Tiffany did make a point - the rest of the girls seem to agree with her statement, nodding or voicing their agreement.

“But, aren’t those the same reasons you like Rafe?” Kiara says, trying desperately to make sense of these girls and their rules.

“What? No - Rafe isn’t like Sarah. He’s cool.” Maybe Jessica states, like she’s shocked Kiara would ever compare the Cameron siblings. Kiara doesn’t know alot about the Kooks, but one thing she knows for certain is that Rafe Cameron is _not_ cool. She doesn’t know Sarah Cameron at all, but she can already sense the double standard the table of girls apply to Rafe and Sarah. Kiara’s fairly certain Sarah can’t be worse than Rafe - she’s a little unsure if anyone can be worse than Rafe - and it frustrates her that Caroline and her friends are so quick to write off the sister of the guy they are fawning over. 

“Why? Cause he’s a guy? He can get away with always being with a girl and showing off his money and being confident cause he’s a dude?” Kiara spits back, and Maybe Jessica visibly recoils. It’s silent for a half second before Caroline tries to calm the waters.

“No, it’s just that Rafe acts differently than Sarah. You’d understand if you met her.” Caroline says, and Kiara’s almost ready to accept that answer. Caroline has a point - Kiara has never really met Sarah, though she’s heard of her. Maybe Sarah is worse than Rafe, and Kiara’s defending someone terrible. Kiara knows better than to die on a hill she’s not familiar with. It’s almost enough to calm Kiara down, to send her back into near silence as she listens to the girls gossip, when Maybe Tiffany starts speaking again. 

“Besides, who are you comparing Rafe to? The lowlifes from the Cut? They would never measure up to Rafe or Topper.” Maybe Tiffany says, and Kiara blinks and suddenly she’s standing up, slamming her chair back. Looking back on it, she doesn’t know why she reacts so violently to Maybe Tiffany’s words. Maybe it’s because she hasn’t seen her boys in so long, maybe it’s because the comparison between Rafe and her boys makes her sick to her stomach. She doesn’t really know for sure, but at that moment, her blood is boiling. 

The girls around the table stare at her in shock, except for Maybe Tiffany, who looks at her like she won something. The other girls around the table are shocked that the girl who was silent for 98% of the conversation was suddenly so angry at one of their own. Maybe Tiffany’s just glad she got the girl who hangs out on the Cut to blow her top.

“You have something to say about me and my friends, huh?” Kiara says, and for what it’s worth, Maybe Tiffany stands up to meet her eyes. 

“Yeah, I think it’s weird that you hang out with so many guys from the Cut when you don’t have to.” Maybe Tiffany says, and Kiara’s seeing red. She knows the implication that’s coming, and it’s not that she’s never heard it before. She’s aware that her three best friends are guys, and they are from the poorer side of town, and they choose to get into trouble whenever they can. It’s not like she’s never had people ask her which one she’s dating, or who she thinks the hottest one is, or if she _had_ to pick one, which one would it be? She can see the thought process from a million miles away, but it still makes her angry. 

“I don’t have to do anything - I choose to hang out with the Pogues because they are 100 times better than any Kook. They are my best friends, so watch your words.” Kiara says, emphasizing the words _‘best friends’_ by slamming her hands down on the table. 

“I think they’re only friends with you because _you’re_ a slut.” Maybe Tiffany fires back, and Kiara’s left kind of speechless. She’s always gotten questions about her loyalty to the Pogues, about her preference among the boys, about her own motivation for joining the rag tag group. But never before has it been phrased like the boys were friends with _her_ for less than platonic reasons, it’s always been directed at her the other way around. If her friendship with the boys was less solid, it might have planted a seed of doubt in her head. But she’s been friends with the boys since 5th grade, and they have the No Pogue on Pogue Macking rule for a reason. She’s friends with the boys and _that’s it._

Kiara’s almost ready to respond when the sliding door to the dining room opens. Kiara’s parents only heard the tail end of the conversation, the part where the girl at the end of the table called their daughter a slut, and they fully expected the parents of the girl to reprimand her. But none of the other parents move, they just fix the girls with a look that has all of them sitting down as if nothing happened. Everyone except Kiara. 

Mike has been part of Anna’s Figure Eight society almost as long as he had been a part of the Cut’s community, and there are still things that absolutely shock him. If a parent from the Cut had heard their child speaking that way to someone else, there would have been hell to pay. The parents from Figure Eight just give a stern look, but there’s no real consequences for anyone. He guesses that the ‘ _no real consequences’_ thing is just how the Kooks work.

It doesn’t mean he has to like it - or that he has to subject his daughter to this stupid dinner party. Especially after the outburst from the girl who is now glaring daggers at Kiara from across the table. Mike sighs softly and reaches into his pocket, pulling out Kiara’s phone. When Anna had told him she wanted to have dinner with the Van Der Workers, he was almost as reluctant as Kiara. Before he left the house, he had grabbed Kiara’s phone from the locked drawer in his office where it sat when she was grounded. He wanted to keep the phone on him tonight in case it went badly and she wanted to head home early. Clearly, that was a good idea. He wasn’t going to reprimand someone else’s daughter in front of them, but he sure as hell wasn’t forcing his daughter to stick around after that. 

“Hey, Kie!” He says, stepping through the door as most of the Kook parents turn away, heading back towards the kitchen. Anna tries to stop him, but he’s not listening to her. “Something’s going on at The Wreck, could you go and check it out for me?” 

Kiara’s stunned for a second, but she moves away from the table towards her dad to take her phone. She’s silently suspicious, because she knows her dad wouldn’t send her to The Wreck to take care of anything alone. Either there’s a really, really nasty disaster going on at the Wreck that has him throwing all of his caution for protocol and safety out the window, or he has something else planned.

When she’s close enough to take her phone from him, he looks her in the eyes. 

“Go see your friends.” He says, quietly enough that no one else hears. Kiara thinks she hears him wrong. She blinks a couple times and asks him to repeat himself, and Mike smiles at her, ruffling her hair. “I’m thinking tonight might have been your due diligence for getting in trouble last week. Don’t make me regret this, but I think you are free to go see the boys.” 

If the circumstances were different, Kiara might have jumped up and down and danced at her dad’s words. But the Kook girls and their parents are still watching, so she settles for hugging her dad and dashing through the yard, heading for the road in the general direction of the Cut. Mike watches her with a smile, before turning to the remaining girls with a hard glare. He may not be reprimanding them, but he wants them to know he heard what they said. When the girls look sufficiently apologetic, he turns around, walking up the few steps of the deck to greet the other parents. He hates this almost as much as Kiara does, but he desperately loves his wife, so he’ll stomach it. 

“Sorry about that. Got a text from Martha, our manager. Crazy night, apparently, and we are way understaffed. Hopefully Kie can help out a little.” Mike says in way of explanation to Charles Van Der Worker, as Anna rolls her eyes at her husband.

“Really? On a Tuesday? Must mean good things for your business, man.” Charles says, clapping Mike on the shoulder.

  
  


As Kiara walks along the road to the Cut, she goes through her missed messages. Almost all of them are from the Pogues, seeing as the boys made a point to text her at least once a day. Depending on the day and the boy who sent them, the messages range from a barely comprehensible string of words and emojis (from JJ) to a full dissertation style breakdown of the Pogue’s plans for the day (from Pope). Either way, no matter who sends the text, there is always some indication in the message of where they’ll be during the day. It’s as if the boys knew she would get her phone back and immediately want to find them.

Which is what she does - based on the texts in their _Pogue Lyfe T-Shirt Company_ group chat, John B and JJ had been boating around before kidnapping Pope and heading for Rixton’s Cove. Kiara hopes that the plan didn’t change and that the boys are still where they had last planned to be. 

She spends the entire walk to Rixton’s Cove going over the dinner party in her head over and over again. She gets angrier and angrier, running through Maybe Tiffany's words and the ease with which the rest of the girls accepted the blatant double standard and the disrespect for her boys. She wants to scream, but she doesn't want to show up at Rixton's Cove crying or yelling like a mad woman. 

She’s exhausted by the time she climbs over the sand dunes to their favorite campfire spot, and it only takes seeing the boys sitting on the logs for Kie to break down in heavy sobs. They don’t even know she’s there until they hear her crying, and then all three boys are turning around and rushing to where she’s standing. 

It’s a rush of emotion - relief from seeing her boys, anger at the Kook girls for ever saying anything bad about them, sadness that her first spark of hope for the Academy was gone. But overwhelming, Kie is struck by the realization that more likely than not, she’s going to have to endure the same shit everyday for the next four years. Everyday of school is going to be like the dinner party for Kiara, and she’s going to have to crawl back to the Pogues every night, exhausted and overwhelmed and unhappy, just so they can hold her up in the sand and tell her it’s alright. 

The boys are frantic at first, because Kiara’s basically unresponsive. From their perspective, Kiara’s been completely MIA for a week and a half, and then she shows up, out of nowhere, to Rixton’s Cove as it’s starting to get dark, and she’s sobbing. It’s a struggle to try to both calm her down and figure out what’s wrong with her, but eventually they succeed, and Kiara’s able to tell them the story of the dinner party. 

“They just - they don’t even care. They already enrolled me!” Kiara says when she finishes her story, throwing an empty water bottle as hard as she can into the ocean. JJ had handed it to her when she had started her story, and she had drained it between telling the boys what happened. JJ and John B share a look. If Kiara’s mad enough to start _littering,_ things are bad. 

Without any prompting, Pope steps in the water and retrieves the water bottle. Thankfully, Kie’s not much of an athlete, so the bottle didn’t get very far. As Pope approaches Kiara to hand her the water bottle, he tries to console her.

“I mean, it’s not _that_ bad of a deal -” Pope says, and Kiara nearly screams. 

“Yeah, I know, they have great resources, and the labs are better, and I can join a fucking field hockey team. I don’t care. I’m going to be miserable!” Kiara says, and Pope is quiet again. It’s still a sore subject for Pope. It takes another moment for Kiara to calm down and steady her voice. “I’m sorry, Pope, I know I’m being selfish but it just - it fucking sucks.”

“It’s alright, Kie.” Pope says, even though he really, really doesn’t get it. Maybe he made peace with the scholarship, maybe it no longer feels like a stab in the chest everytime someone mentions the Academy, but that doesn’t mean Pope understands Kiara. He would _kill_ to have the opportunity she’s being handed, and he knows she’s aware of that. He knows the Kooks are difficult, and he knows there’s a rivalry between the Cut and Figure Eight, but if he’s being honest, he knows Kiara could just as easily fit in with the Kook as she does with the Pogues. He’s seen her at some Kook events his dad has catered, and she’s mostly miserable and usually only smiles when she sees him. But once in a while, he sees her sit next to her Grandmother - the rich one, the one on her mom’s side, the one who Pope has literally only seen when he’s helped his dad cater. She’ll sit next to her rich Grandmother, cross her legs and smooth her pretty dress and for a fraction of a millisecond, Pope can’t imagine Kiara as anything but a Kook Princess. Even though she’s a Pogue, even though he’s seen her knee deep in mud when they dig for clams or drenched in sweat at the Chateau on the hottest days of summer, there’s a split second where he’s not even sure he recognizes Kiara. He knows her, but part of knowing Kiara is realizing there’s a whole other part of her life that he will never experience. 

It drives Pope a little crazy sometimes, to be friends with someone like Kiara. Someone who has so much, who has every opportunity in the world, who chooses to be friends with the likes of himself, JJ, and John B, despite everyone from her parents to her teachers to the police department telling her it’s a bad idea. Pope loves Kiara - she’s his best friend - but sometimes he wonders how she really, truly feels about them. Sometimes, he thinks Kiara likes to rebel so much that she built a whole friend group around pissing off her parents.

But those thoughts don’t typically linger - Kiara’s far too loyal and loving to be anything but genuine in her friendship. She’s a true Pogue, a ride or die kind of friend, even if Pope can’t understand her logic when it comes to the Academy. 

“You’ll be fine, Kie, no matter what. You still got us Pogues.” JJ says, breaking Pope out of his train of thought. JJ’s looking up at Kiara, the fire turning her hair and eyes golden. She stomps her feet a little, then sits down on the log like a petulant child. JJ just laughs, wrapping his arm around her shoulder, and Pope thinks JJ might be right. He’s pretty sure Kiara will be fine, and she’ll always have the Pogues.

“Hell yeah!” John B says from the other side of the fire, working on removing a toasted marshmallow from his stick using two graham crackers. John B doesn’t look up from his work when he speaks to Kiara. “We can fuck up anyone who gives you a hard time.”

Kiara rolls her eyes because the scrawny boys around her love to act like tough guys. She wants to give them a hard time, but she’s too thankful to have them around her and supporting her, so she just smiles gratefully. 

The rest of the night is spent goofing off around the cove. John B and JJ do whatever they can to get Kiara to smile, and Pope eventually forgets the Academy disaster and joins in. By the time Pope pulls the HMS Pogue up to Kiara’s dock as he sings, loudly and off key, to an old Beach Boys song, the knot in Kiara’s stomach has completely unraveled. The boys were right, she will be fine.

  
  


The knots in her stomach come back in full force on her first day of school. She’s in the Kook Uniform and standing in the big auditorium, awaiting orientation. The room is filled with faces she either doesn’t recognize or doesn’t get along with, and the air smells of axe body spray and Victoria Secrets perfume. She sees Caroline and Maybe Tiffany from across the auditorium, though they are blessedly ignoring her. She doesn’t know if she wants to gag, or run away, or hide under the bleachers. If she could manage all three at once, she’d probably be all set. Instead, she pulls out her phone, wary of the few teachers mulling around.

**_Kiara Carrera_ **

_Don’t tell Pope, but this really, really fucking sucks._

She sends the text to JJ, who responds almost immediately with a row of laughing emojis. She once again curses the fact that Kildare Coast starts a full week before the public high school. The boys are all still at the Chateau, and John B and Pope are probably not even awake. 

**_Jonathan James Maybank_ **

_i bet u look hot in ur school uniform_

Kiara rolls her eyes but smiles. She looks down at the black pants, button down, and blazer. She categorically refused the plaid skirt for precisely this reason.

**_Kiara Carrera_ **

_I look hot in everything, so that’s besides the point_

She responds, and she can picture the slight blush and approving nod JJ would give her. She’s smiling when one of the teachers patrolling the assembly yells at her to put her phone away. Despite all her bravado, Kiara is slightly afraid of the Kook teachers, and she shoves her phone in her backpack quickly. She doesn’t see JJ’s next text until after school ends, when she’s already headed to the Chateau after a shitty day of school. 

**_Jonathan James Maybank_ **

_and u r also hella smart, so ur gonna be fine_

_good luck! send me a selfie!_


	7. How To Party Hop, a guide by Kiara Carrera

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, if you noticed, I have had this story tagged with “implied/referenced suicide” from the beginning, and this is the chapter that deals with it. I based this off of the comment that Kiara makes to Pope in episode 6 - she tells him “just as I’m about to slit my wrists, the queen asks me if I want to go save baby sea turtles” - and I took that to be pretty literal. There is only a discussion of suicide, and there’s no action behind the words, but if this is something that might be triggering to you, I wanted to warn you before the chapter starts! Also - please seek professional help if you are ever feeling like Kiara. Please, please treat yourself better than these four idiots do. 
> 
> Besides the hell both I and the creators of the show have decided to put these poor characters through, I hope you enjoy this chapter!

Kildare Coast Secondary Academy is much worse than Kie expected.

She had expected it to be bad - she had bemoaned her attendance for weeks, if not months, leading up to the first day of school. She fought her parents and ranted to her friends to no avail, and she dreaded her future at the school. 

But truthfully, if she was being a hundred percent honest, she had held out some hope. It was a small grain of hope, but it was there nonetheless. She partially blamed Pope - he had said, during one of her rants, that it would be _“statistically improbable for everyone to hate you.”_ At the time, it hadn’t given Kiara much comfort - _what was statistics to say who her friends would be?_ \- but the more she thought about it, the more it made sense. Pope was usually right about things, or on the right track, and his insistence on the mathematical improbability of being an outcast actually made a little sense. She had a small grain of hope that he was right. Despite her worst fears, and the disastrous dinner party she was forced to attend, she figured there had to be some group of Kooks she could hang out with. Maybe they were from the Environmental Club, or the Debate Team, or even just some of the social outcasts she figured had to exist in a fancy school like the Academy, but she would find them eventually. 

She had gone through middle school in her weird maybe-Kook-maybe-Pogue limbo, and she had found a group of friends that would set the world on fire for her. Even outside of her Pogues, she had casual friends on the Cut - people she had classes with, people she grabbed when they were assigned group projects, friends who she planned beach clean up days with. They had all more or less accepted her, despite the differences in income and social standing. Even when her parents started forcing her to go to Kook parties when she was 12, there were never any snide comments or sideways glances from her friends on the Cut. Maybe it was because everyone knew an attack on Kiara was an attack on the Pogues, and JJ, John B, and Pope wouldn’t hesitate to retaliate. Maybe it was because Kiara had grown up in the Cut system, so everyone knew her well enough to see through the Kook bullshit she was forced to endure. Maybe the Cut was just slightly more accepting of the Kook playing as a Pogue. Whatever the case may have been - she wasn’t super popular on the Cut, but she was generally well-liked and got along with everyone. Kiara had a faint glimmer of hope that maybe, _maybe,_ she might make some friends at the Academy. Maybe _‘friends’_ was too strong a word - she just figured she would find some people to eat lunch with. Worst case scenario, she could hang out with Cassidy. 

But it seemed like Kiara was wrong - she starts the year with Cassidy, but everyone else at the Academy ignores her. There’s snide comments from a few of the more popular people - Tiffany, Rafe, occasionally some asshole who goes by the name _"Topper"_ \- that get under Kiara’s skin, but most people just ignore her. It’s a weird place to be in - the Kooks don’t accept her because of her allegiance to the Cut, but most of her more casual friends from the Cut had all but abandoned her because of the Academy. 

Kiara’s relationship with Cassidy, the only other person at the Academy that she could consider a friend, was only getting more and more complicated. On one of the first days of school, Kiara caught Cassidy in the hallway and asked her if she wanted to eat lunch together, and Cassidy was as desperate to have someone to sit with as Kiara was. It wasn’t exactly perfect - Cassidy sitting across from her in the Kook uniform was just another reminder that Pope (and subsequently, JJ and John B) were a couple of miles away, probably throwing notes to each other in their history class - but it worked well enough. 

Kiara thinks maybe at some point she’ll get over the fact that Cassidy won the scholarship that belonged to Pope, but for now, it’s an almost ever-present thought. Everytime she gets an answer wrong in her math class, she remembers her years of sitting next to Pope, who could tell when she was unsure of her answer just by her reaction to her name being called. She finds herself about to lean over to make a joke to one of the boys in English, or to toss a note to them about the white-washed history they are fed by their teacher, or flick some paint at them in art, and she’s almost violently reminded that the only person she has in this school is Cassidy, and they don’t even share any classes. Despite their difference in schedule and circumstance, the two girls try to get through it together for the first few weeks. They sit with each other at lunch and during orientation and it’s ... fine. 

On the first day they sat together, Cassidy and Kiara had chosen a lunch table in the corner, far from the hustle and bustle of the lacrosse, hockey, and football players in the center of the cafeteria, and it quickly became their table. It was next to one of the double doors that students exited the cafeteria from, so Cassidy and Kiara could make a break for it as soon as the bell for the end of lunch rang. They would sit on opposite sides of the table, facing each other and occasionally making small talk. They don’t talk about middle school, or the Cut, or the two groups of friends they left at the public high school, but they’ll talk about the crazy art teacher they share, though they have her different blocks, and they’ll discuss clubs they might think of joining. 

Cassidy typically spreads her books or homework around herself, covering her half of the table, and she punctuates math equations or grammatical analyses with bites of a sandwich - usually, Kiara noted, peanut butter and jelly. Kiara, on the other hand, had taken to throwing her backpack into her locker before lunch started, and not touching it again until lunch was over. She got exactly 35 minutes with her phone and away from teachers and classwork, and she was going to use it. The boy’s lunch starts 20 minutes after hers, and she would spend 20 minutes scrolling through Instagram or Twitter and picking at whatever lunch her dad had packed for her - usually a fancy salad or pasta in her reusable containers - until one of the boys would text the group chat to let her know they were at lunch, and they would spend the entirety of the rest of lunch sending memes back and forth or talking shit. John B and JJ would sometimes sneak conversations during their other classes, and one day she had an entire game of Connect Four with John B during the first half of her lunch (she won by a landslide), but Pope would only text during lunch. It became a sort of ritual, and although she knew the boys didn’t need the 15 minutes of texting like she did, they never failed to do their best in cheering her up.

One day, when Kiara had gets to their lunch table first and sets herself up to wait for the boys to text back, Cassidy approaches the table hesitantly. Instead of sitting across from Kiara, she stands by the table and waits for Kiara to acknowledge her. Normally, Kiara gives Cassidy a few minutes to set up her books before launching into a discussion about how her art class went, but Cassidy doesn’t move to put her books down. After a pregnant pause, Kiara lowers her phone and looks at Cassidy, who appears nervous, shifting back and forth on her feet. Kiara quirks an eyebrow at the girl, setting her phone down on the table. 

“Hey, Cass.” Kiara says, and Cassidy sighs. Kiara can sense the nerves rolling off Cassidy in waves, and she’s mildly curious about what could make the girl so fidgety. It’s not like Cassidy is ever calm - she’s the most anxious person Kiara's ever met, and Kiara had spent the last four years with Pope as one of her best friends - but the air around her today has a particular sort of energy that gives Kiara pause. 

“Hey, Kiara.” Cassidy takes a little bit of a deep breath, and then she blurts out “The Robotics Club invited me to sit at their table today.” 

Kiara blinks, and suddenly Cassidy’s nerves start to make a little bit of sense. Kiara hates to admit it, but she’s not completely shocked. Kiara was halfway expecting this - Cassidy had started the school year in the same beat up chucks and ratty headbands as Kiara. The fashion on the Cut isn’t exactly diverse - while there’s no school uniform, there is a Cut uniform. Then, one day, Cassidy had come into school with a pair of pearl earrings (fake, as far as Kiara could tell - what little she knew of Cassidy’s home life told her that much) and Kiara had sighed inwardly. Pearl earrings, fake or otherwise, weren’t exactly a popular accessory on the Cut. She knew what that meant. 

First, it had been the earrings, and then Cassidy started wearing a thin gold chain with the letter _‘C’_ on it. The necklace was similar to the one all the Kook girls seemed to wear, which confused Kiara. Did the Kook girls think it was something special to have a first letter of your name? Everyone had to have a first letter of their name, and there were only 26 letters in the English language, meaning that having a name that started with _‘C’_ or _‘K’_ or even ‘ _Z’_ was not, in any way, unique. The lack of individuality that they represented made Kiara grimace slightly, but she had tried to hide her reaction when Cassidy had first shown up with it around her neck. Kiara much preferred her bracelets, woven by her own hands because of her best friends, or the puka bracelet her Nana had gotten her, or the crystal necklace that JJ had ‘ _acquired’_ for her birthday last year. When Kiara had asked him where he had gotten it, he avoided the question by telling her it was supposed to help with her _‘zen.’_ She rolled her eyes and hadn’t taken it off since. Kiara’s jewelry had meaning and uniqueness and a story she could tell that meant something to her. It was not based on the letter of her first name. 

But she gave Cassidy some leeway. It was against Cassidy’s nature to be so out of the status-quo, and Kiara could appreciate that. Sometimes, part of survival is acclimating. 

So it’s not a shock to hear Cassidy finally admit that she’s found some people she fits in with. And Kiara is perceptive enough to know that there is no way the Robotics Club would allow her to sit with them. Kiara tries to be gracious. 

“Oh, really? That’s cool, Cass.” Kiara says, reaching for her phone, going for nonchalance but probably overshooting into dismissive territory. Cassidy shuffles for a second. Kiara wants to tell her to just go and sit with her nerd friends. _It’s fine._

“I’m probably going to go sit with them.” Cassidy says, and Kiara lowers the top of her phone to look at Cassidy as she opens Instagram. 

“Yeah, that’s cool. Don’t let the nerd talk bore you to death.” Kiara says with a little bit of a forced smile, but she means it. Cassidy making friends is not a bad thing. She keeps repeating that to herself.

“I could sit with you tomorrow, if you want?” Cassidy says as more of a question than anything, and Kiara has to force herself not to roll her eyes. 

“Don’t worry about it, Cassidy.” Kiara says, and it feels a lot more final than she wants it to when Cassidy nods once before walking quietly to a table full of students about halfway across the cafeteria. She keeps looking back at Kiara, who smiles at her the first time and then pretends to be preoccupied with her phone the other times. Kiara can see, from the corner of her eye, that the robotics kids push and shove each other to make room for Cassidy, and despite the predicament Cassidy’s departure from the table has put Kiara in, she smiles. 

  
  


There’s a marked difference between Cassidy and Kiara, and the reactions they garnered from the Kooks. Cassidy has her merits - she’s intelligent and quick and kind - and she’s also good at flying under the radar. She did her best to play the part, to make everyone forget she was anything other than a Kook. She didn’t reach into the upper stratosphere of popularity for friends - she garnered a small group of tolerable Kooks from the Robotics Club and the Math Team. She didn’t stir the pot.

It seemed like all Kiara did was stir the pot. Kiara never backed down from a fight - when someone said something problematic in her class, she called them out. She matches the semi-professional uniform with her bandanas and sometimes unruly hair. When it becomes clear that Cassidy is never going to return to their table for lunch, she begins eating at one of the few outdoor tables the school offers. The air is cooler, so there’s less people milling around outside the farther they get into the semester. Kiara takes to meditating for the first twenty minutes of lunch, as her incessant scrolling on Instagram becomes both frustrating and depressive. She sits in Lotus Pose, her hands on either knee, and breathes through the whispers of _“that’s the hippie girl”_ she hears whenever people pass by her. 

The boys all have after school activities - JJ and John B join the JV soccer team, and Pope has an ever increasing number of clubs he’s attending. If she’s not going to be hanging out with the boys, she decides to attempt a couple clubs at the Academy. She doesn’t even make it in the doorway for the first meeting of the Environmental Club, when she sees a blonde girl with a single use water bottle enter the room in front of her. She rolls her eyes and figures the club is not her cup of tea - the only thing that bugs Kiara more than littering is performative activism. Even the Debate Team seems insufferable - she goes to one meeting, where the President of the club starts the meeting by announcing his girlfriend is the _“First Lady of Debate”_ and Kiara wants to evacuate the planet for the rest of his tenure. Her two biggest passions are kind of a wash at the Academy, and as such, she decides to visit her Dad at the Wreck for the hour and half she has before the boys are done with their meetings and practices. 

Kiara also has an ongoing theory that the Kooks might have been a little more open to Cassidy than they were to her. Cassidy was from the Cut, and she was trying to play a Kook to fit in. The mere existence of Cassidy at the Academy played into the Kook’s narrative that the residents of Figure Eight were inherently superior to the residents of the Cut, and it was a privilege for someone like Cassidy to be attending their school. Kiara was a Kook, someone from Figure EIght, who regularly rejected the idea that the Kooks were any better than anyone else. Kiara, for all of middle school, had chosen her Pogues over any of the Kooks. It makes sense, then, why Cassidy has a small group of friends she roams the hallways with, and an ever increasing closet of acceptable skirts and floral headbands. It makes sense that Kiara still sits alone at lunch. The fact that the Kooks almost all outrightly ignored her shouldn’t affect Kiara as much as it does - she didn’t even really want to be friends with any of the Kooks in the first place - but something about going into school everyday with no one to talk to was messing with her psyche. 

She keeps telling herself she can survive with JJ, Pope, and John B. Sure, John B and JJ give her shit about the Academy everyday, and she can’t complain about school in front of Pope without feeling guilty, but the first few months at the Academy change virtually nothing about their relationship. Kiara runs home after school, changes her clothes, and meets her dad at the Wreck. The boys swing by the Wreck after their practice and meetings are over, and then the three of them maneuver their way to the Chateau like they had all of middle school. Most of the time, Kiara can finish her ever-increasing pile of homework while she waits for the boys to appear, but sometimes she has to sit at the Chateau’s kitchen table, twirling her pencil and shushing the boys as she tries to figure out what the hell _polynomials_ are. It becomes a new kind of normal, something they can all kind of live with, although it’s not ideal. Besides, it’s not a big deal. Nothing changes. 

Well, almost nothing changes. 

It happens on an otherwise unmemorable day in October. Pope had texted in the group chat that he had to help his dad cater a party, and Big John had picked John B up from soccer practice to work on his boat in the marina. Big John had told JJ he was more than welcome to join them for some _‘light maintenance’_ , but JJ declined. Normally, he loved working on the boat with Big John and John B, but he had to pick up his pay from one of the Kook families he landscaped for and he wanted to hide his money under his mattress at home. After stopping by the Kook house, he had gotten home to find Luke passed out on the couch, but JJ could tell from the lack of pill bottles and the amount of beer cans that Luke could wake up at any moment. He snuck in as quietly as possible, shoved his money under his mattress, and didn’t breathe until he safely snuck out of his window. 

He had briefly considered going straight to the marina from his house to help John B and Big John, but his stomach was growling and he knew Kiara hid a box of Honey Nut Cheerios in the cupboard at the Chateau. Constant workouts for soccer only exacerbated his already elephant-sized appetite, and he was always conscious of the food in the Chateau. It was a split second decision, and he had immediately bee-lined for the Chateau. Big John had anticipated they would be at the Marina for hours - they wouldn’t miss JJ for 15 more minutes. 

The cheerios were exactly where JJ thought Kiara would leave them, and he started by shoving a few dry handfuls into his mouth. He might have made it to the cupboard, for a bowl so he could have a proper bowl of cereal, but he pauses when he sees Kiara’s backpack on the couch. 

“Hey, Kie?” He yells out, surprised she was at the Chateau when she didn’t mention it in the group chat. He usually assumes she has homework to do or something when she’s silent in the chat. 

When he doesn’t hear an answer, he drops the box of Cheerios on the counter and moves into the living room. He checks both bedrooms, in case Kiara came to the Chateau for a nap. It wouldn’t be the first time she’s showed up only to take a nap, but usually she’s a pretty light sleeper, and JJ yelling would have woken her up. He walks to the front door, peering out to see if she's in the hammock. He knows she likes to nap in the hammock, and that's just about the only other place JJ would think to look for her. When she's clearly not in the hammock, JJ's about to shrug it off. Maybe she forgot her backpack yesterday (unlikely - she hadn’t texted in the group chat about missing her backpack) or maybe she was with John B and Big John at the marina (highly likely - the only person better with motors than Kiara was Big John). He's about to return to his quest for a proper bowl of cereal when he sees the outline of someone - he’s 90% sure it’s Kiara - sitting in the HMS Pogue. It’s odd that Kiara’s alone in the boat, and JJ decides to check on her before he heads to the Marina. 

He’s halfway across the yard before he can clearly see that it is, in fact, Kiara sitting in the boat with her back to him. Her long curly hair is tied up in a messy bun, the type that would get her written up for being ‘unkempt’ at the academy, but she’s still in her uniform. He’d never seen Kiara in her uniform - she always changes before she comes to hang out, but he recognizes the colors and the logo - and he bites his tongue as he comes up with a million different ways to tease her about. He smirks a little, walking down the dock, not bothering to stay quiet.

“Hey Kie!” JJ said as he drops into the boat, startling her. He thought she had heard him approaching the boat from the dock, or yelling from inside the Chateau, so he’s as shocked as she is when she jumps a little at his words. 

Kiara had been too wrapped up in her own thoughts to notice JJ, and she closes her eyes tightly the second she recognizes his voice. She had come to the Chateau to be alone - it was a rare feat to find any kind of peace and quiet at the Chateau, but she thought she might get away with a miracle today. Pope had texted in the groupchat that he was working with his dad, and John B had responded saying he was at the marina for maintenance. Kiara had just assumed JJ would be with one of them. 

It’s not that she doesn’t want to see the boys - she loves them all, and being around the three of them is the easiest way to ensure her mood is lifted. But she knows Pope doesn’t understand her reluctance to give the Kook Academy a chance, and John B and JJ are too charismatic to understand her loneliness. Sometimes she just wants to cry in a boat and not have someone make a joke or give a gentle reminder that she’s one of the luckiest people on the island. She doesn’t want jokes and gentle reminders - she wants to be angry and sad.

Kie doesn’t turn to him right away, wanting to save a little dignity, but JJ beats her to it and walks around the boat to face her. She can tell from the way his footsteps falter that he's noticed the tears running down her face. She's partially mortified, partially irate. “Woah, hey. What’s up? Are you hurt?” 

  
“No.” She says simply. A part of her wants to tell him to bug off - she really doesn’t want to talk or laugh or see anyone right now. She just wants to be sad and angry and alone. But, when she sees him, she realizes another part of her - a larger part of her - is begging for the comfort of her friends and the reality that some people on this godforsaken island like her. She wants to be alone but she doesn’t want to feel so lonely anymore. It’s a confusing feeling that Kie doesn’t know how to deal with.

“Oh no. Did that fucking asshole do something? Kie, I swear to god, I’m going to kill him, you can’t stop-“

“It’s not Rafe. Or, it’s not all him.” She says, stopping JJ’s rant, knowing from JJ’s posture and tone exactly who he’s talking about. The week before, she had briefly mentioned that Rafe Cameron was none too fond of her. As a senior, he ruled the school and had the potential to make Kiara’s life a living hell. Even though Kiara had only mentioned it briefly, JJ had hyper fixated on it.

“Oh.” JJ says, sitting down next to her. He’s far enough away that their shoulders aren’t touching, but if Kie wanted to, she could lay her head on his shoulder comfortably. It’s like he can tell she’s conflicted about him even being here, and he’s trying to make it as easy on her as possible. “Should I pretend to understand what you are talking about or do you want to explain?”

Kie smiles at him a little bit, but it’s joyless. “I don’t know how to describe it to you.” she says at first, but JJ shrugs, leaning back.

“You can just talk. I don’t necessarily need to understand everything.” He says it with practiced nonchalance, a tone that lets her feel like he’s listening to her, but he’s not over invested - the perfect blend of interest and detachment that makes Kiara feel safe enough to start talking. Kiara’s grateful for it - she didn’t know what she needed to hear, but it seems like JJ knows exactly what to say.

“You smell terrible.” Kiara says instead of explaining anything. She leans away from him, and JJ lifts his arm to sniff his armpit. Kiara pretends to gag. 

“Eh, soccer practice.” JJ explains, and Kiara scrunches her nose up. He doesn’t say anything else, and neither does she. JJ doesn't push her, or act too interested, and that's what eventually breaks Kiara. He seems perfectly content to wait for her to talk, sitting in silence and watching the gentle waves of the marsh approach the boat. Normally, JJ's incapable of sitting quietly, but after running several miles in practice everyday, his almost limitless supply of energy is weakened to the point where he can happily sit down in a boat and not break the silence that borders on awkward. Kiara doesn't like the silence - it's so unusual - and after a minute, she sighs loudly before trying to gather her thoughts into something that might be called coherent. 

“At the Academy, it’s like - they ignore me, or they talk about me behind my back. It shouldn’t bother me, but it does. I don’t know why I’m letting it get to me.” She says finally, her voice small, and JJ sucks in a breath. He thinks he knows what she’s referencing. Ever since she mentioned Rafe, JJ’s been beating himself up over the fact that he made Kiara’s life more difficult. At the time, he was acting out of anger - someone was talking shit about one of his Pogues, and he was going to show them exactly what he thought of that. Looking back, he realizes that by beating up one of the most popular seniors, he inadvertently sabotaged Kiara’s social life at the Academy. Kiara had mentioned Rafe’s snide comments and JJ can tell from her tone that it’s actually a lot worse than she’s letting on. JJ hates it. He hates that he caused her any pain. 

JJ understands, at least intellectually, that he’s not the root of the problem. Rafe’s an asshole who says disgusting things about girls and bullies them into tears later. But, deep down, JJ also knows that Kie is the one of the smartest, kindest, funniest people he’s ever met and if JJ hadn’t beaten up Rafe, she would probably be super popular with the Kooks. “It's like everyone hates me. I thought I would make one or two friends, but here I am, a friendless loser and ...” she starts crying as she says it, and JJ breaks his self-made barrier to wrap his arm around her. Despite the fact that he’s still sweaty from practice, she seems receptive to it, her head resting on his chest and his heartbeat next to her ear. It’s silent for a few minutes, JJ actively holding back any jokes because, as much as he wants to see her smile, he’s not sure that would help her right now. Her breathing is ragged as she says something that makes JJ’s blood run cold.

“Sometimes it feels like it’d be easier if I just … ended it all right now.” Kiara says it quietly, as if she doesn’t want to admit it to JJ but also she doesn’t want to leave the ugly thought in her head. 

Every cell in JJ’s body freezes. Somewhere in his mind, he understands her implication, and his entire body goes into panic mode. His mind flashes back to health class - a frazzled teacher named Mrs. Hartly and a lesson on suicide prevention. He’s desperately trying to remember what was said - how to help, who to call, what he should do when Kiara says something like _that._ But his mind isn’t working right, he’s hearing the words over and over again in his mind. It’s the worst thing he’s ever heard. It’s unthinkable, it would be _unbearable,_ to live in a world without Kiara. She’s still in his arms, but JJ is miles away, in a classroom at Kildare County Middle School as Mrs. Hartly distributed flyers with the phone number for the National Suicide Prevention hotline.

Holy shit.

“No, oh my god, Kie. Don’t fucking say that.” His mouth is moving before his brain starts working. It’s probably not exactly what the manual Mrs. Hartly passed out recommended, but for the time, it’ll have to do. JJ’s brain is currently short circuiting. 

He’s brought back when she sniffles and looks at him. “You can’t just say stuff like ‘end it all’.” He continues. “You can’t...”

“I know, I know. I’m not serious. It’s just... sometimes it’s really hard, JJ.” He nods, as if he understands, and he hugs her closer, hoping he’s helping. He stares blankly out at the water, trying to control his breathing so Kiara will calm down. There’s a million things he wants to tell her, but he can’t get any of them out of his mind.

  
  


They spend about an hour on the boat, talking about everything except the vague threat Kiara may or may not have made. When she calms down enough, she pushes him away and tells him to jump into the water to wash off some of the sweat. While he’s swimming around, she tells him a little bit about her classes. When he clambers back onto the boat, she opens up about her teachers and the lame clubs she might join in a way she doesn’t dare speak in front of Pope. He nods, comments on her musings when appropriate, but mostly he just listens. She tells him about Cassidy, and the way they had some sort of agreement in the beginning of the year that has since come undone. She talks about how frustrating it is to be the bottom of the totem pole at the Academy, the socially awkward tendencies that she’s picked up because she doesn’t have any friends. JJ doesn’t judge or argue or make a joke. He just listens.

When she’s done ranting, it’s silent for a minute. She lets out a huff, her shoulders sagging slightly. She feels like she just broke a dam, telling JJ everything she has been avoiding mentioning for weeks. JJ knows the look on Kiara's face - he's seen it before, when she's so angry and upset about something, but she feels drained from talking about it. She usually gets it from something more abstract - her anger about the climate or a corrupt politician - and JJ has yet to perfect his reaction to such a look. He doesn't exactly know what to say. Should he comfort her? Try to tell her it's not all that bad? Agree with her that the entire institution is terrible? He doesn't know, but he thinks maybe a distraction is in order. His usual go-to is deflection, and although Kiara's just unloaded all her problems, it might be beneficial to get away from them for a second. 

"Want to test the upper limits of this dinosaur?" JJ says after a sufficient amount of silence, slapping his hand against the HMS Pogue's ancient motor.

Kiara nods enthusiastically, and JJ thinks he may have made the right choice. They spend an hour whipping the HMS Pogue around the Marsh, and JJ nearly flips Kiara off the side of the boat a handful of times. When they finally dock the boat, Kiara’s laughter is bubbling out of her in a way that somewhat settles JJ’s mind. 

Stepping off the boat feels like stepping back into reality. Big John and John B still haven’t made an appearance - whatever issues are occurring on Big John’s boat are much worse than anticipated. Kiara can’t afford to stick around and wait for them to get back, or even go to the Marina - she has several hours of homework she’s been putting off since getting to the Chateau. When Kiara tells JJ as much, he just nods and tells her he’s going to walk her to her house on his way to the Marina. Neither of them mention that Kiara’s house is in the opposite direction of the Marina. 

Truth be told, JJ’s just trying to put a good face on so Kiara won’t know how freaked out he is. He’s still drowning in her words from earlier, and he thinks maybe walking her home will calm him down. Maybe he’ll get some clarity on how Kiara’s feeling.

Despite his own turmoil, he doesn’t broach the subject as they walk - Kiara’s laughing and smiling and telling JJ about her plans for the weekend and he doesn’t want to break the tentative happiness they’ve created. 

She thanks him for walking her home, offers him a soda or an iced tea or some food in return that he turns down, and then hugs him quickly before running up the stairs to her front door. She disappears inside, yelling _“goodnight!!”_ over her shoulder, and JJ doesn’t feel any calmer.

He lingers outside for longer than usual, wondering if he shouldn’t follow her inside and tell Mr. and Mrs. Carrera what happened. They’d know what to do, but he also has a deep distrust of all parents. He’s warring with himself, trying to decide what would help Kie the most, when he hears the window to her bedroom open. 

“Hey, stalker, what are you still doing here?” She says, smiling down at him. He sighs and looks up at her, still trying to decide his next move. He’s grateful she’s smiling again, but he’s apprehensive to leave her. At the boy's hesitation, Kie’s smile falls. “JJ, what’s wrong?” 

“Are you okay?” He says finally, and she looks at him quizzically. 

“JJ, what are you talking-” Kie starts, but JJ cuts her off. 

“Are you going to be here? In the morning?” He says finally, and her face falls as she understands what he’s referencing. His worry increases for a second, but then a small, appreciative smile appears on Kie’s face again and he can almost breathe. 

“I’m gonna be here every morning, JJ. I’m not going anywhere.” She says, and he finally takes a deep breath. It’s not perfect, but the look on her face is genuine and it finally calms his nerves. He smiles up at her, waving a three finger salute as he turns to leave her yard. 

“I’m holding you to that, Carrera!” He says, and the laugh he hears in response from her is contagious. 

  
  


Neither of them mention that night to John B and Pope, but it becomes a semi regular thing for Kie to find JJ, wherever he may be, and vent. JJ’s not exactly gentle around her, per se - nor does he treat her noticeably differently. He just pays more attention to what she’s saying, and doing, and how she’s acting. The night when JJ finds her alone in the HMS Pogue, he immediately goes back to the Chateau and googles warning signs for suicide. In middle school, when Kiara had briefly tutored him, she had taught him a trick to memorizing things - read it twice, say it four times, and write it down ten times. Once Pope took over as tutor, JJ had never used it - Pope was not a fan of rote memorization - but Kiara had drilled it into JJ's head for a science quiz. Maybe it hadn't worked for the science quiz, but JJ tries it with the list of warning signs he finds on the internet and that shit is seared into his brain. His hand aches after the exercise, but it’s worth it. 

His extra attention to Kie doesn’t show anymore warning signs - she seems relatively stable, if a little stressed about school. He thinks that maybe just venting every couple of days will do Kiara good. He knows he’s no professional, so he mentions that Kiara should talk to the Academy’s school therapist (they have one - he looked it up). Kiara shakes her head, says there’s no way she’s going to talk to a Kook psychologist, and JJ is briefly tempted to bring up everytime she told him it would be beneficial if he went to the guidance counselor for therapy. He decides not to throw it back in her face, though. He just nods and then asks her how her math class is going. Pushing her too far might make her clam up, and the last thing JJ wants is for Kiara to stop talking to him - it’s more beneficial to talk to someone than no one at all. The vent sessions will have to do for now. 

Sometimes Kie’s venting is sobbing her eyes out, sometimes venting is kicking and throwing things, sometimes venting is sitting on the hammock and talking about the future. Either way, the nights when Kie finds JJ become sacred, and it’s an unspoken rule that those nights can’t include John B or Pope. JJ never pities Kie, never makes her feel childish for throwing a tantrum and as much as Kie loves John B and Pope, she doesn’t think the same could be said for both of them.

And Kie relies on JJ, more than anyone else, to keep her sane during her Kook Academy tenure. If she doesn’t have anyone except JJ, she could survive the hellscape of a school.

It’s at JJ insistence that Kie continues to try to make friends. It’s not that JJ likes the Kooks, or even that he thinks it’ll be particularly good for Kie to be friends with rich assholes. It’s just that JJ knows a friend on the inside would help Kie, and he’s willing to pressure her into joining clubs and going to parties if it means she might not be miserable. 

She rejoins the Debate Club with his encouragement, because he’s certain her debate skills will win her a few friends. He saw her take down Pope at the Middle School Debate Tournament with his own eyes, and he knows that the nerds on the Debate Club will be begging to be Kiara’s friend once they realize her talent. She finds a partner she doesn’t hate in another freshman named Archie Stevens, and she learns to tolerate the nearly intolerable President. It’s not perfect, but it gives her something to do twice a week when the boys are at their various activities. 

As much as JJ tries to be a good influence, he’s still JJ Maybank, and he’s insistent that Kiara should go to a Kook party. Him and John B had started making semi-regular appearances at the Boneyard, but only when Kiara and Pope aren’t available. Pope’s far too nervous around alcohol, and Kiara’s parents would lose their minds if she was caught at an upperclassman party. It’s easier, and more fun, to just hang out at the Chateau when they are all available. But on the occasions where JJ and John B find themselves alone at the Chateau, the Boneyard becomes something of a haven. Between the soccer team and the Boneyard, John B and JJ are doing well for themselves in high school. JJ is certain Kiara could turn around her entire freshman experience with a few Kook ragers and a couple of nerds from the Debate Club.

That's why Kiara finds herself outside Max Smith’s house one Friday night after a football game. The shitty football team lost, obviously, but the party looked like they had won the Superbowl. Kiara didn’t even really know if she was invited, but she thought it was one of those ‘open invite’ situations. 

Turns out, she was right. She, and half the school, had shown up to Max’s house ready for a good time. Kiara tries to make small talk with anyone who shows her any amount of kindness and silently curses JJ for telling her this was a good idea. She manages to find her debate partner, Archie, milling around, and she strikes up a conversation with him. They discuss a few of the Debate topics, and Kiara finds out Archie detests the President as much as she does, but the conversation isn't exactly deep. It's only a few minutes before Archie disappears with his boyfriend. 

After Archie’s disappearance, Kiara manages to find Cassidy in a corner. Kiara’s a little shocked to see Cassidy at the party at all - she didn’t really think it’s the robotics team’s scene - but she recognizes some of the girls floating around the party from Cassidy’s new lunch table. It’s a little bit awkward, since they haven’t really talked since that day in the cafeteria, but Kiara sticks by her regardless of the tenuous nature of their relationship. At least they have some sort of relationship. 

It helps that Cassidy wanted to talk to her briefly about Travis, the boy who almost fought JJ but instead stole the plaque from the Cameron’s. Cassidy and Kiara had made a point of avoiding any discussion about their Cut friends during their time as lunch buddies. It felt like they couldn’t talk about their friends in the cafeteria without reminding everyone that they were not supposed to be there. Somehow, the atmosphere of the party allows them to talk about the things they didn’t dare in the Academy’s cafeteria - something about the loud music and the smoke filled air makes it seem like they are having a private conversation in the crowded room.

Cassidy asked Kiara if she had heard anything about Travis, and Kiara had thought for a minute, scratching her head.

“Uh, no, I haven’t really heard much about him. I think he’s okay. Aren’t you guys friends?” Kiara had asked, and Cassidy just shook her head slowly. Kiara immediately feels like a bitch for asking. She remembers that JJ had told the Pogues things were awkward between Travis and Cassidy since she had kissed him, but Kiara had thought they had moved past their awkwardness and were friends again. Clearly, that had not happened. 

“He’s pretty adamant that I can’t be friends with Kooks and him. We got in a fight a few weeks ago and I haven’t really talked to him since.” Cassidy said sadly, looking down at her water bottle, fiddling with the label. 

_Oh._ Kiara thinks. This isn't about the kiss. This is about something much different. Kiara scrambles for something to say to Cassidy, and she comes up short. Kiara suddenly understands Cassidy’s need to fit in at the Academy, her abandonment of their lunch table. It makes sense. If her boys abandoned her like that, who knows how Kiara would have reacted.

“I’m sure he’ll get over it.” Kiara says finally, even though the words sound lame to her own ears. Cassidy just nods like she absolutely does not believe her at all.

Kiara had never been more thankful for her boys. Unlike Travis, they had stood by her while she had transitioned into the Academy, and they understood she might benefit from a Kook friendship. In fact, despite his own ambivalence, JJ was actively campaigning for her to befriend any Kook. She made a mental note to remember to thank them the next time she saw them. 

  
  


It wasn’t much longer after that conversation that the cops showed up. It was inevitable that Peterkin was going to get word of the party - the noise was obnoxious. It was just a matter of time, and when Kiara saw the flashing lights outside the big bay windows of the mansion, she bolted out of the back door and down the beach. She was almost relieved that the cops showed up, because the last hour had been the most awkward of her life, and now she could go home to her Pogues and tell JJ that she at least tried to have a good time. 

She makes it to the Cut on foot without being found by the roaming police officers, only to find the Chateau completely empty. She’s confused for a second before realising JJ and John B must be at the Boneyard. She’s never been to the Boneyard at night, but she’s obviously gone during the day to swim. During the day, the Boneyard is a good place to get away from all the tourists. During the night, the Boneyard is the place for high school students to let off some steam.

She maneuvers her way through the undergrowth to the Boneyard from the Chateau. It takes longer than she thought it would, given that she jumps farther into the woods each time a car passes by, in case Peterkin is looking for a reason to break up the Boneyard Party. When she finally does make it to the Boneyard, she’s shocked to see all three of her boys seated around the campfire with about 100 of their closest friends and tourons. 

John B’s the first to see her as she approaches the fire, and he throws his hands up, spilling beer all over Pope, who starts uncharacteristically swearing at him. 

“Kie!!” John B says, running up to hug her and ignoring Pope. He practically tackles her in a hug, wrapping his arms around her shoulders, and Kiara relaxes into the hug. It’s always the best feeling in the world to come back to her boys after a day with the Kooks. “I thought you weren’t gonna make it!” 

Kiara laughs at her goofy, and obviously drunk, best friend. His over excitement is contagious. “Uh, yeah, Kook party wasn’t it.” She says in way of explanation while she untangles from his hug. His limbs are so long, it takes a minute, but eventually she starts approaching the fire while John B stumbles his way to the keg.

Once Kiara’s close enough to the fire, JJ gives her a look from the felled tree he’s sitting on. “Did you even give it a fucking chance?” He’s clearly buzzed, at least, but he handles himself better than John B does. He’s balancing a red solo cup in his hands, his red hat turned backwards on his head. Kiara narrows her eyes at him, and he smirks in response. 

“Yes, of course I did. I went, talked to a few people, and then it was busted by the cops.” She says, and at the word ‘cops’, Pope is up and looking around frantically. 

“The cops were there? Are they gonna come here?” He says, and JJ just tugs sharply on his arm to sit him down. 

“Chill out, Nervous Nancy. Peterkin can’t even tell there’s a party going on from the street. The Kooks were probably being idiots about it.” JJ says, and Pope sits down but doesn’t stop fidgeting. JJ sighs, and looks at Kiara for confirmation. Kiara nods, agreeing with JJ.

“The music was so loud, and Max’s neighbors called three times to tell him to turn down the music before the cops showed up.” Kiara embellished the last part, but she thinks it’s mostly harmless. Max’s neighbors couldn’t have been happy about the party, so it’s probably not that far from the truth.

“By the way,” Kiara says, sitting down next to JJ on the log as John B comes back with a red solo cup to offer her. It’s overflowing with beer, and JJ laughs as John B sloshes it all over Kiara. She glares at him before continuing her statement. “You guys didn’t tell me you were gonna be at the Boneyard tonight.” 

“You’re not the only one who gets to party, Kie.” JJ says, smirking at her. Kiara rolls her eyes at him, shoving him with her shoulder before taking a sip of her beer. It’s a weird dichotomy from the vodka punch she had at the Kook party - the beer tastes worse but somehow feels more fitting. She doesn’t think much about it before she gulps down a little more. She’s going to be slightly tipsy in no time - her few experiences with alcohol have taught her that she’s kind of a lightweight. “How’d you find us?” JJ says after a moment, and Kiara shrugs. 

“Lucky guess.” She says, and it’s then that she sees Travis from across the party. He’s by the beer keg, his arm around some touron girl, talking animatedly with a couple of his friends that Kiara recognizes from the baseball team. 

“Another thing,” Kiara starts, and both Pope and JJ turn to look at her. John B’s already clocked out of the conversation, instead choosing to sit next to some brunette that Kiara remembers from Pre-Algebra. He’s a very social drunk. “I ran into Cassidy Evans at the party.” At the name, Pope tenses up. Fresh wound, and all that. JJ does nothing to indicate that Kiara has ranted to him about the demise of their not-friendship-but-maybe-understanding. “I just want to say thank you, to you guys. She told me that Travis and her friends completely abandoned her, like they couldn’t be friends with her cause she went to the Academy and had friends that were Kooks. And as miserable as I am, I think she has it way worse. Like, I know you guys won’t abandon me, even if I make friends with some Kooks. And I just - I don’t know. Cassidy got me thinking and I wanted to mention it.” 

“No problem.” Pope says after a beat of silence, and Kiara notices that whatever leftover nerves he had about the cops seem to dissipate as she talks. “We got your back like you’ve got ours.”

“Yeah, as long as you don’t forget who your real friends are, Carrera.” JJ says, slinging an arm around her shoulders. Kie’s got a warm feeling in her chest that isn’t associated with the beer or the vodka. Her eyes briefly flit to John B, who’s nearly falling off the log he’s sitting on as he talks to the brunette girl, and she knows she’ll have to repeat the sentiment to him in the morning. She laughs at John B's goofy nature, pointing her red solo cup at him. JJ laughs outrightly while Pope rolls his eyes. There’s a lot of shit going on, but in that moment, she feels like the luckiest person in the world to have the three biggest idiots surrounding her.

  
  


She’s slightly more drunk and a lot more courageous when she starts to leave the Boneyard with JJ leaning on one of her shoulders and John B on the other. Pope is flitting about the three of them, trying to keep all of them on their feet. It’s a hard, and thankless, task. 

It’s as Pope is busy trying to pick up the trail of cups JJ is dropping that Kiara sees Travis ahead of her, and without Pope there to stop her, she decides she wants to give him a piece of her mind. 

“Hey Travis!” She yells, and JJ lets out a breathy ‘ _oh shit’_ while John B just giggles. Travis turns around at his name, pausing for a moment to allow the three musketeers to stumble up to him.

Pope's about ready to flip out - trying to manage three drunk Pogues is like herding cats, and if Kiara finds out JJ littered, she'll have all four of them at the beach tomorrow to clean it up. The way the night is going, Pope just wants to sleep until noon. He also doesn't want to have to break up a fight, and he rushes to meet his friends when he realizes they've approached Travis. He doesn't know what Kiara's going to say, but he can't imagine it's good. 

“I just wanted to tell you Cassidy asked how you are doing.” Kiara says innocently, and even in her beer-induced stupor, she doesn’t miss the way Travis’s eyes go from open, friendly, and slightly glazed over to hard in a millisecond. 

“Tell her I’m doing fucking fantastic.” He says flippantly, about to turn around and leave the Boneyard. Kiara’s not gonna accept that, and she stumbles as she unwinds herself out of the boys she’s holding up.

“It’s a pretty shitty thing to do to her, Travis. Abandoning her when she’s going to a new school.” Kiara calls out, and Travis tenses up. She can tell she’s hit a nerve. Pope groans. This is the last thing he wants. 

“Listen here-” Travis starts, and both John B and JJ are immediately standing up a little straighter, letting Travis know that he needs to watch the way he talks to any of the Pogues. Travis barely registers the change of posture. “She made a choice to go to the fucking Academy, just like you did, and you’ll both live with the consequences. You are a Kook - you shouldn’t be here.” 

“Hey!” JJ says, at the same time Pope rushes in to get in between him and Travis to try to stop whatever fight is about to break out. “Don’t you dare talk to her like that.”

“She belongs here more than you do, sweetheart.” John B says, his words slightly slurred but his stance intimidating.

Travis trains his glare on Kiara for a second before he scoffs. “Just wait until she abandons you guys.” Travis doesn’t give them a chance to respond - he turns around and walks off before any of them can react. Pope breathes in, glad that they avoided the worst case scenario. 

“Fucking asshole.” John B slurs out, and JJ and Kiara look at each other before breaking into giggles.

“Fucking asshole.” Kiara agrees, and JJ and John B each resume their positions leaning on either of her shoulders, and they start stumbling their way back to the Chateau. Pope just sighs loudly, looking up at the sky and praying he can get the four of them home unscathed and without a WWE match.


	8. The Idiot's Guide to Saving Turtles and Making Friends

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PSA: this was written by someone who has unfortunately never witnessed a turtle hatch, and therefore probably 95% of these facts are wrong. I did my best with google and the like, but honestly…. well, if you ever do go to watch a turtle nest hatching, it won’t be like this. But the magic of storytelling will make it work!
> 
> Also …. remember when I said I had 60k words? Opps. Honestly, I’m not even sure we are halfway through this disaster. This has grown significantly larger than I anticipated. Despite having a degree in engineering, clearly I can’t count.
> 
> This chapter is based on the tidbits we get from Kiara about the start of her friendship with Sarah, and the day they went to hatch turtles. It also touches on the fact that Sarah (briefly) mentioned that Ward was from the Cut.

“JJ, for the love of god, can you back up?” Pope says, as JJ dances around the fire, trying to get the best angle to roast his hot dog. This was the fourth hot dog JJ was cooking, each of them paler than the last, despite his claims that he was an _Expert Hot Dog Roaster_. “You’re going to fall into the fire.”

  
“I’m steady on my feet, Pope.” JJ responds, punctuating the sentence by pretending to fall into the fire. Pope jumps up from his seat, ready to pull JJ out of the fire, but he sighs when JJ rights himself. JJ laughs, and Pope sits down, swatting at the air. “See what I mean, man? Nothing to worry about.”

  
“Are you sure these things are cooked?” John B asks, spinning around the hot dog he has been roasting on a stick. Pope’s exasperated response to JJ is lost to the wind as everyone turns to look at John B as he speaks.

  
“Doesn’t matter. Hot dogs are pre-cooked. You could technically eat them straight out of the package.” Kiara says, flitting her eyes away from John B as she realizes what he’s asking. She turns her marshmallow around above the fire, watching it intently. John B shrugs at Kiara’s comment, shoving half the hot dog in his mouth.

  
“If you guys gave it fifteen minutes, we’d have optimal hot dog roasting temperature.” Pope says, his tone still exasperated. JJ moves around him, still trying to find the best angle, and Pope tries to shove him over. JJ just laughs as he catches his balance.

  
“Bullshit. There’s a fire. That’s optimal hot dog roasting temperature.” JJ says, gesturing to the roaring fire in front of him. Kiara and Pope share a look and roll their eyes.

“No.” They say at the same time.

  
“You got to wait until there’s no flames.” Kiara says calmly, then swearing when her marshmallow catches on fire. JJ mutters something about _karma._

  
“The fire has to be embers. That’s when it’s best for cooking.” Pope adds, backing his seat away from the fire and ripping the blanket he has off his shoulders. His blood pressure is rising, he’s sure of it.

  
“We’d already have embers...” Kiara says, looking at her marshmallow ruefully. She fixes JJ with a look, as if it was a personal attack on his part to set her marshmallow on fire. He throws his hands up, as if to say _don’t look at me!_

  
“... if you guys hadn’t kept adding wood to the fire.” Pope adds. Kiara turns her glare to John B, who was the last to feed wood to the fire.

  
“It was going down!” John B says in defense, and Pope tries to count backwards from 10.

  
“That’s the point!” Pope says, and John B shrugs as if that isn’t the 47th time they’ve had that same conversation. Pope loves the Pogues, he does, but if he has to explain the mechanics of roasting food on a fire _one more time,_ he’s going to lose his mind. He tries to tell himself he won’t come to their Rixton Cove Campfire Dinner next time John B proposes it in the group chat, but he knows that’s a lie. He wouldn’t miss a Rixton Cove Campfire Dinner if the world depended on it. He just might ask Kiara to bring him a hamburger, so he’ll have something to eat while Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum try to mess with the fire.

  
“The big fire is more fun.” JJ says, throwing the empty hot dog bag on the fire.  
  
“Johnathan James Maybank -“ Kiara starts, and John B giggles at the fact that Kiara uses JJ’s full name. “If you throw one more piece of single use, BPA filled plastic into that god damn fire, I’m going to call the EPA on you.”

“BPA? EPA? So many acronyms, Kiara Rose Carrera.” JJ says, winking at her. She briefly contemplates throwing him in the fire.

  
“Besides, what’s the EPA going to do? Sue his dad?” John B says, before trying to fit the other half of his hot dog in his mouth.

  
“Good luck getting any money out of that bastard, especially for the environment.” JJ says. “Which just brings me back to my point - ” Kiara cringes. She thought the risk of JJ falling into the fire might actually derail the conversation. She desperately wants JJ to forget his point. “Why are you so hell bent on not going?”

  
Kiara sighs loudly, and she curses the fact that she ever told the boys about the Environmental Club event she got invited to. Sarah Cameron has approached her during their shared science lab, complimented her on her _“Save the Bees”_ shirt, and then asked if she wanted to join the Environmental Club for their Save The Turtles events. She had been so shocked by Sarah’s sudden appearance and outward civility that she had blanked and told Sarah she would think about it. Sarah smiled, wrote her number down in Kiara’s notebook, and told her to let her know if she could make it.

  
JJ has been like a dog with a bone since she mentioned the Turtle Day invitation. Kiara had regretted telling him about it for roughly the same amount of time.

“It’s going to be some performative bullshit.” Kiara says, tugging her blanket around her shoulders and not meeting any of the boys’ eyes.

“Better than us. At least they perform.” John B says, shrugging his shoulder. Kiara stares blankly at him, wondering if it’s even worth asking what that’s supposed to mean. She sighs after a second, turning away from him.

“I’m not going.” She humphs, sinking further into her seat and hoping the boys drop it. She has no such luck. 

“Kiara, you have literally never hesitated to save any animal in your entire life. You wouldn’t talk to me for three days in sixth grade when I ran over a frog with my bike.” John B said, and Kiara shrugs her shoulder. 

“You killed it.” She says as justification, and John B throws his hands up. 

“It was an _accident.”_ He says, his voice incredulous.

“It was _murder._ ” Kiara corrects, and John B rolls his eyes. He’s about to respond and continue the childish back and forth when Pope interrupts.

“This is besides the point.” Pope counters, and JJ points to him. 

“Can you remind me what the point is, Pope?” JJ says, as if he’s giving an elevator pitch. 

“The point is that all the data suggest you would have a great time saving the turtles.” Pope says to Kiara, and JJ nods. 

“Pope’s right. Dude, you love this shit. What’s the worst thing that’s gonna happen? You get pissed off cause Sarah Cameron takes more selfies than she saves turtles? You should go, you’re bound to make another hippie friend.” JJ says, and Kiara tugs the hood of her sweater shirt up over her head. It's not actually her sweatshirt - it's the one she got from Disneyland for John B all those years ago. He's outgrown it in the intervening years, but he keeps it clean and on the top shelf of his closet for whenever Kiara gets cold. 

“There’s no hippies at the Academy, they’re all rich.” Kiara says as she pulls on the strings of the hood to close it around her face, and JJ raises an eyebrow at her.

“You’re a rich hippie.” He points out, and she flips him off without looking out from her self-made sweatshirt armor. He smirks when she doesn’t have a come back for that one. “You should go.” He says again.

“But what if it’s terrible?” She whines through the hood, and JJ smiles. If Kiara’s whining, he’s already won this argument. JJ makes his way over to her, shoving her head a little bit because she can’t see him. She swats at his hand, ripping the sweatshirt hood away from her face and glaring at him.

“It can’t be terrible - Sarah Cameron’s hot.” John B says, and Kiara rolls her eyes so hard she’s pretty sure they’re going to fall out of her head. JJ swats John B on the shoulder (but notably doesn’t argue). 

“If it’s terrible, then I’ll beat up every last one of them and we can continue on with our lives. Gotta take a chance, Kie.” Kiara grimaces at JJ as he says it, but she can tell from the look on his face that he’s not going to drop it until she gives in. And if JJ’s going to insist on her attendance, Pope and John B will be just as insufferable. Honestly, she’ll do whatever she can to shut them up. 

“ _Fine.”_ Kiara says under her breath, taking out her phone, and JJ and Pope high-five like they’ve won something.

  
  
  


**_Kiara Carrera_ **

_Hi Sarah! It’s Kiara from biology. I think I can make_

_it to the conservation event on Saturday._

**_Sarah Cameron_ **

_Oh that’s awesome! I’ll put your name on the list_

_and I’ll text you with any more details!! :))_

  
  
  


It’s scary how quickly Kiara takes to Sarah. She had been so certain she would hate Sarah - Rafe was intolerable, and Sarah sat at the same lunch table as Tiffany - but it only takes a few hours of the pair hanging out for Kiara to realize she might have found her person. 

Sarah tells Kiara to meet her at Tanny Hill so they can walk to the beach together, and Kiara spends a good few minutes shuffling awkwardly outside the mansion. It’s barely dawn - Sarah wanted to get to the beach earlier than 6:00 to set up signs for the hatching, and Kiara had scheduled her arrival at the mansion to coincide with Sarah’s timeline. When Sarah finally comes down, Kiara does everything in her power to appear as relaxed as possible, but her hands shake slightly. The idea of spending 15 minutes - much less the whole day - around Sarah Cameron, Queen Bee, is enough to have Kiara hyperventilating. 

Blessedly, Sarah does almost all the talking. Kiara’s silent as Sarah goes on about her morning - _she almost slept through her alarm, but then somehow her brother heard it going off from the next room over and he had gotten so frustrated with the incessant beeping he had walked into Sarah’s room and hit her with a pillow, and then she was already running late so she had to have cereal instead of a smoothie, and it was just a disaster_ \- and Kiara nods along, trying to decide how to deal with someone like Sarah. It’s not difficult to be around her, per se, but Kiara’s constantly reminding herself that Sarah’s a Kook through-and-through, and at any moment, she might make Kiara regret coming to the Save the Turtles day. 

She only really starts to relax once they make it to the beach and Sarah asks her to help put up some informational signs. Kiara and Sarah arm themselves with a staple gun and a few wooden posts, heading down the beach to set up the signs. It’s early in the morning, and the only people milling around the beach are a few runners, a couple volunteers from the local conservation club, and the volunteers Sarah wrangled from the high school. As Kiara and Sarah work, it’s mostly silent, until Sarah finally breaks the silence.

“Am I being ridiculous?” Sarah asks, and Kiara has no clue what Sarah’s referring to. Normally, Kiara would answer _“yeah, probably”_ because, well, Sarah’s a Kook and there’s a high statistical probability of her being ridiculous, but Kiara’s trying to be more open. Instead of risking an answer, Kiara just hums in response. “Olivia showed up with a _plastic water bottle_ to a _Save the Turtles_ event. I mean - that’s ridiculous, right?” Sarah points to a brunette halfway down the beach drinking out of a single use plastic water bottle. Kiara suddenly understands why Sarah might be frustrated.

“Oh, yeah, for sure. That’s some performative bullshit.” Kiara says as she places one of the informational signs onto the beach’s community board. She doesn't mention that she's pretty sure this _entire_ exercise is performative bullshit, and she's pretty sure Sarah Cameron's as performative as the rest of them. 

“Exactly! Performative bullshit! I just - I organized this to actually do something, rather than talk about upcycling clothes like we normally do, and it’s so frustrating to see people not take it seriously.” Sarah says, and Kiara follows her further down the beach. 

“Wait - you organized this?” Kiara says, her shock clear in her voice. She had assumed one of the seniors, or maybe one of the teachers, had set it up, and Sarah was just trying to get attendance up.

“I mean, the high school club, yeah. The conservation team was already going to be here - they do every hatching on Kildare Island - but I was the one that reached out and got Kildare Coast involved.” Sarah pauses for a minute, whacking a wooden post into the sand a few times. “No way would Millie or Amanda actually do something to help the environment - they just want to get into Yale, and being President and Vice President of the Environmental Club looks good on their applications. Why do you think I asked you to come?” Sarah says after a minute, and Kiara shrugs.

“I figured you needed to get attendance up.” Sarah chuckles a little, as if Kiara said something crazy. 

“Oh, no, I have more than enough attendance with the club. I invited you cause you fought with Tiffany over fast fashion in English and you were wearing a Save the Bees shirt. I figured you would give us some environmental street cred.” Sarah explains, and Kiara vaguely remembers the day in class that her and Tiffany got in a fight about fast fashion. It wasn’t particularly memorable, but Kiara realizes that Sarah must be in that same class. She doesn’t know whether to be proud or offended that Sarah invited her because she had _“environmental street cred.”_

“I hope I can give you more street cred than Millie.” Kiara says after a moment, nodding to the President of the Club who had shown up in wedge heels. Millie was struggling to get to the volunteer area, as her heels kept sinking into the sand. This is exactly what Kiara was worried about when she agreed to go to a Kook Conservation Event. 

“Jesus Christ…” Sarah says under her breath as she sees Millie, and Kiara’s stunned that Sarah’s voice sounds as disgusted as she feels. She didn’t think any of the Kook girls would agree with her over something like this, but it sounds like Sarah might be on the same wavelength as her. It’s not like Sarah’s dressed particularly ruggedly - she’s in cutoff shorts, a breezy shirt, and a bikini top - but she’s at least wearing sneakers and has the common sense to scoff at Millie’s audacity. Honestly, it’s more than Kiara was expecting. 

“How do you even put those on at -” Kiara checks her watch “ - 5:45 in the morning? I mean - oh my god, does she have a full face of makeup?” Kiara says incredulously as Millie gets closer. She tries to keep her voice down, because she really, _really_ doesn’t need another enemy at the Academy, but she must do a pretty shitty job of it because Millie shots her a look. 

“I swear to god, some of the ex-pageant girls don’t sleep. You can find them at any time of day and they have fake eyelashes on.” Sarah says, turning around to try and keep Millie from hearing her words. Kiara doesn’t know if it works or not, but she follows Sarah’s lead. 

“I don’t get it.” Kiara says, almost to herself, and she’s shocked when Sarah agrees. 

“Girl, me neither.” Sarah scoffs. Okay, so maybe the Save the Turtles event wasn’t a completely bad idea. She grimaces at the thought that she’ll have to admit that JJ was right once again. “So, uh, you went to Kildare Middle School last year, right?”

Kiara spoke too soon. Sarah says it conversationally while walking to the next batch of informational signs, but Kiara’s weary. Well, at least if this goes south, she can tell JJ he was a shitty friend for making her go.

“Uh, yeah.” Kiara says, clamming up completely. Sarah doesn’t notice, or she doesn’t mention it. Whatever the case, she continues speaking, undeterred

“That’s what I thought - I know basically everyone from Kildare Coast, unfortunately.” It’s silent for a moment. “You got the Bothwell Scholarship, right? My dad got it when he was in Middle School.”

"You're dad won the Bothwell Scholarship? He went to Kildare Middle School?" Kiara says, completely flabbergasted, and Sarah just nods as if that's not completely ridiculous news. As if it's not earth shattering that the richest man on Figure Eight was born on the Cut.

"Oh, yeah. He lived in a house by Pelican Marina. My Grandma lived there for a few years, but she's moved to Florida. I'll have to introduce you to him - it's pretty cool you guys got the same scholarship." Sarah adds, motioning to the next location of a informational sign.

“Oh. Uh, no - I didn't - I didn't get the scholarship. That’s Cassidy.” Kiara can't process the fact that _Sarah Cameron's dad_ was once a scholarship kid at the Academy. She also can't process the fact that if Pope had gotten the scholarship, he might have been as successful as Ward Cameron someday. She pockets the thought for later - she'll give herself time to be angry about that tonight. Right now, she just needs to survive the hatch.

Kiara sees that Sarah’s confused, and Kiara realizes she has no idea who Cassidy is. “Cassidy Evans. She’s on the robotics team.” Kiara explains.

“Oh, the one with the super cute headbands! Oh my god, yes, I know her - she’s in my math class.” Sarah says after a minute, and Kiara nods. Sarah seems completely comfortable talking about the scholarship, and it's such a relief for Kiara. She's watches her words about the scholarship and being a maybe-Pogue-maybe-Kook with literally everyone in her life - her parents, the Kooks, Cassidy, even sometimes the boys - and it's nice to have someone who's not as emotionally invested in the topic to talk with. “Are you guys friends?”

“Uh- “ Kiara has no idea how to respond. “Kind of? We had different friends in Middle School, and she’s really busy with the Robotics team now.” Kiara says, instead of getting into the deeper, weirder nature of their relationship. “She actually beat my best friend out for the scholarship.”

Kiara doesn’t know why she says it, or why she even brings the boys up. Talking to Sarah seems easy, and she seems interested enough that Kiara wants to keep talking to her. It’s the first time any of the Kooks have shown her any amount of civility, and she has no idea what to do with it. Clearly, when shown too much unexpected kindness, Kiara responds by oversharing. She’ll make a note of that.

“Oh, shoot, really?” Sarah says, looking for all the world like she really feels bad for Kiara. “That sucks.”

“Yeah.” Kiara says, laughing, trying to brush off Sarah’s attention. “It’s a little awkward.”

“Oh my god, I bet. Do you still hang out with your friends from middle school?” Sarah asks, and Kiara nods. She keeps her mouth shut for a second, because she doesn’t know how to tell Sarah they are the only friends she has without sounding like a loser. She doesn’t need to look clingy within the first half hour of their tentative understanding.

“Yeah, they’re great. Cassidy’s friends are a little … hard on her about the Academy.” Kiara says instead of oversharing, and she cringes when she calls attention to the ancient Cut vs. Figure Eight rivalry. She really doesn’t need to be bringing that up right now, right as she’s just about to have a full, normal conversation with a Kook. Not just any Kook - the Kook Princess. 

“What do you mean?” Sarah asks, and Kiara shrugs. Sarah looks confused enough that Kiara would almost believe she doesn’t know about the rivalry, but everyone on the island knows about the rivalry. Even if Sarah is a little isolated from it, Kiara knows she’s aware of it. There’s a reason this is the first time they have talked.

“They told her she couldn’t be friends with both the K- the people from Figure Eight and from the Cut.” Kiara says, catching herself from saying _Kook._ Oh, what a disaster that would have been - calling Sarah a Kook to her face would not have been a good thing. Why is everything so awkward?

“Oh my god, you’re kidding! Poor Cassidy.” Sarah says, completely ignoring the fact that Kiara just almost called her a Kook. She seems completely unphased. “Ugh, I hate the whole Figure Eight vs. Cut thing - it’s just so frustrating. Like, our addresses don’t make us better or worse than anyone, you know?”

Kiara is shocked for a second, but then she nods enthusiastically in response. “Exactly! That’s what I’m saying!” She can’t believe she’s agreeing with Sarah Cameron on so many things. The world has well and truly lost its mind. The simulation has glitched. 

“What about your friends?” Sarah asks, her words light but Kiara can almost sense an undercurrent of genuine interest. Kiara stills for a second. 

“What about them?” Kiara says, suddenly defensive. If Sarah has something to say about the Pogues, Kiara’s going to have to walk off this beach immediately. 

“Are they gonna dump you cause you’re talking to a Kook?” Sarah says, her eyes bright with laughter. Okay, so Sarah's comment might be a little punchy - but she's joking. She's laughing with Kiara about the stupid, arbitrary boundaries on the island. She's not making fun of the boys or demeaning the Cut. Kiara's so shocked, she starts laughing. 

“Oh, god, no. They wouldn’t survive without me.” Kiara says, and then she hesitates for a moment. She doesn’t know if she should mention it, but eventually the growing silence prompts her to speak. “Actually, they are the reason I’m here.” 

“Wait - really?” Sarah says, standing up suddenly, as if she’s completely shocked. Kiara nods at her, kind of surprised by Sarah’s response.

“They convinced me it would be a good idea to make some friends. Apparently I’m a little mopey.” Kiara says, trying to sound like it’s a joke and not like she’s spent the last few months hating her existence.

“You are not mopey!” Sarah says, and Kiara shrugs cause, yeah, she’s been pretty mopey for a month and a half. The last 30 minutes had been the most un-mopey she had been in months. 

“Eh, they have a point though. Plus, you know, saving the environment.” Kiara says, gesturing vaguely at the sky, and Sarah nods at that.

“So, your friends won’t dump you if I invite you to sit with me at lunch on Monday?” Sarah says, and Kiara balks. She’s silent for a minute while Sarah keeps setting up signs, and then Kiara shakes herself out of it. 

“Wait - are you serious?” Kiara asks, and Sarah looks at her like she’s crazy. 

“Oh, god, of course. Please, please say you will. I need someone who’s not absolutely bat shit crazy at my table.” Sarah says, and it’s the way that Sarah phrases it - like Kiara’s saving her instead of the other way around - that has Kiara beaming.

“Yeah, I think they’ll be fine with that.” Kiara says, finally. It’s the least she can do after Sarah’s been so nice to her.

  
  


“Do you think it’s going to happen today?” Kiara asks Sarah. They have moved down the beach to sit across from the turtle nest, sitting in the sand side by side, waiting to see if the nests will hatch. Most of the other girls are milling around the parking lot, or sitting in the back of the pick up truck one of the older volunteers brought, but Kiara and Sarah are too excited to be that far away from the action. 

“Oh, god, I hope so. Can you imagine what Amanda will do if I made everyone come down here at the ass crack of dawn and the turtles decide _not_ to hatch?” Sarah says, rubbing a hand down her face. The time is quickly approaching 7:00, when the turtles are supposed to make an appearance, and there’s been no sign from the nest that anything was going on. Kiara and Sarah had already decided that they would come back tomorrow morning if the hatch didn’t happen today, but Kiara hopes it doesn’t come to that. She’d prefer to sleep-in at least one day of the weekend. 

“I’m sure it’s going to happen. Even mother nature is scared of Amanda’s wrath.” Kiara says, and Sarah laughs outrightly. It’s as the words are leaving Kiara’s mouth that one of the volunteers rushes down the beach to where Kiara and Sarah are sitting. 

“It’s happening!” The volunteer, who had shown up in a truck and introduced himself as Michael, says. “They’re coming!” 

Kiara and Sarah are on their feet in second, moving to the nest as quickly as possible and peering over the shoulders of the volunteers as they explain what the movements in the nest means and what’s happening. When the first baby turtle appears out of the sand, Kiara gasps loudly. 

“Oh my god, it’s so cute!” Kiara says, and Sarah grabs her hand. 

“There’s more!” Sarah says, pointing to another part of the nest where a pair of turtles appear. Kiara and Sarah gush over the baby turtles, pointing at them and arbitrarily naming them as they appear. 

“Do you want to hold one?” Michael asks the girls, and Kiara and Sarah look at each other in shock.

“Can we?” Kiara asks. “Is it safe?” 

Michael looks suspiciously at the group of teenagers on the other side of the nest, some of whom look genuinely interested, and some of whom look like they spent the night before at a Frat House. “Uh, yeah, you two can. Because you guys organized it.” He says, as if he’s looking for a reason to let Sarah and Kiara hold the turtles that would bar the others from holding one. 

“Oh, I didn’t -” Kiara starts to say, and Sarah cuts her off. 

“Yes! Of course - we planned it, and we need a picture for our instagram!” Sarah says, and Kiara looks at her, shocked. When Michael goes to pick up the turtle, Kiara whispers to Sarah. 

“I didn’t plan anything!” Kiara says, and Sarah shrugs. 

“Michael doesn’t know that. Just go along with it - you can help me plan the next one.” She says. When Kiara hesitates, Sarah shoves her shoulder. “Don’t you want to hold a turtle?” 

That’s what breaks Kiara, cause the turtles are _adorable._ Michael finds two stronger baby turtles, and gently hands them over to the girls. Sarah coos over the turtle as it’s placed in her palm, and Kiara handles the baby like it’s made of glass. Michael offers to snap a few pictures, and it turns into a mini photo shoot of the two of them, each holding a turtle, and Kiara doesn’t even care about the glares she’s getting from the girls behind them. Her and Sarah just giggle louder when they hear one of the other volunteers explain that not everyone can hold a turtle. It feels good to be in on a scheme with Sarah.

Kiara can not believe the sight in front of her. She’s quickly learning that Sarah Cameron is a lot more goofy than she lets on - she’s waving a beach towel over her head viciously, trying to scare away the seagulls that are attempting to eat the turtles making their way down the beach. Sarah had screamed the first time a seagull dive bombed a turtle and snatched it up, and she had made it her mission to be a one-woman anti-seagull army. It would have been inspiring, if she had any ammunition over than a beach towel from some Disney cartoon Kiara didn’t recognize. 

“Is she doing any good?” Kiara asks Michael, who actually pretends to ponder it for a second. Michael's a few years out of high school, and he had explained to Kiara earlier how he was working on a degree in Marine Biology and Environmental Studies. He's got windswept blonde hair and a tendency to distrust every high school volunteer other than Sarah and Kiara. He was nice enough to let Millie and Amanda sit in the air conditioning in his truck when they started complaining about the heat, but Kiara's suspecting he just wanted them out of the way. 

“Well….” Michael says, and Kiara shoots him a look. “Yeah, okay. Probably not. I mean, her screaming bloody murder probably did more to scare away the seagulls than her intricate towel dancing, but it’s the thought that counts.”

“Kiara!” Sarah yells, out of breath from throwing her body around, trying to scare off the seagulls. “Kiara, you gotta help me! They are _everywhere!”_

Kiara looks at Micheal, who just shrugs. “I have some pool noodles in my truck that might work better.” 

“Yeah, I’m good!” Kiara yells back at Sarah, rolling her eyes at Michael’s suggestion. 

“Come on, Kiara! The turtles are going to die!” Sarah says, and Michael disappears from her side. Kiara spends another few minutes watching Sarah flail helplessly before Michael is back at her side, holding out two pool noodles.

“Your best friend is in desperate need of an army. This is the best I can do.” He says, and Kiara is so shocked by his words, she just accepts the pool noodles. She thanks him, and blankly walks to Sarah, trying to figure out how her and Sarah met this morning but already appear to be _best friends._ The universe _has_ to be glitching. 

She snaps to it when Sarah grabs the pool noodle from her hand, viciously whipping it around to get a particularly nasty bird away from the nest while yelling _“sea rat!”_ at it. 

Yeah, the universe is definitely glitching.

  
  


The rest of the day goes by in much the same fashion - Kiara and Sarah bonding over their shared frustrations, trying to save the turtles from the rabid beasts that are seagulls, and the Kook girls doing absolutely nothing. Kiara’s shocked to realize that Sarah doesn’t shy away from the work - they spend several hours cleaning up trash along the beach and moving driftwood with volunteers when the turtles have all disappeared to sea. Both girls roll their eyes when Millie stumbles through a motivational speech about _“giving back”_ and _“doing your part.”_ It feels like something fell into place for Kiara. She hasn’t clicked with someone this well since she met the boys. Sarah shocks her. 

“Whew - that was a full day of work.” Sarah says, as they trudge up the path to the parking lot. The suns nearly setting, and Kiara and Sarah have been at the beach since just about sunrise. Kiara is bone tired but also vibrating with the possibility that her and Sarah might be friends. I mean, she can’t remember the last time she laughed as hard as when her and Sarah were going at the seagulls with the pool noodles. It had to be one hell of a spectacle, but Kiara didn’t care. It was fun, and Sarah didn’t care, and the two of them together managed to scare away most of the seagulls.

“I’m so ready to go home and pass out.” Kiara says, wiping sweat from her brow. “Maybe after a shower.” 

“Fuck that, I’m just gonna turn on the hose, dose myself, and sleep on the outdoor furniture.” Sarah says, and Kiara laughs at the imagery. “You think I’m kidding, but I’m not.”

“Sarah, I just saw you wage war on a flock of birds - I know you don’t specialize in idle threats.” Kiara says, and Sarah bursts out laughing. 

“Oh my god, do you think one of the girls took a video of us? I’d be mortified.” Sarah says, and Kiara goes silent. She hadn’t thought about that - the last thing she needs is a cringey video circulating the internet to be the shitty cherry on top of the dumpster sundae that was her high school career so far. It’s like Sarah can sense Kiara’s hesitation. “You’re still gonna sit with me at lunch on Monday, even if I’m a social pariah?” The thought that Sarah could be a social pariah is so outlandish, it’s laughable. But once again, Sarah’s wording it in exactly the right way - she’s telling Kiara she needs her as much as the opposite, and it makes Kiara feel like she’s not a charity case. It does good things for Kiara’s psyche. Kiara pauses too long in her answer - Sarah prompts her again. “Kiara?”

  
“Oh, I’m definitely sitting with you.” Kiara says. “Especially if you are the social pariah. The chance to be friends with Seagull Girl? Too good to pass up.” 

Sarah laughs outrightly, wiping her brow. “Whew, good. I thought I lost you there. Scared you away.”

“Well, you were damn close with the beach towel, but you pulled yourself together when you called out Olivia in your thank you.” Kiara says, and Sarah looks around to make sure Olivia’s not around. 

“Was it that obvious? Oh my god - I just didn’t want anyone to think they could get away with single use plastic on my watch.” Sarah says, still searching for any sign of the brunette.

“Her face was bright red when you said it.” Kiara says, and Sarah swears. 

“She’s going to be so pissed at me.” Sarah says, and Kiara shrugs.

“You did the right thing. What can she be mad at you for?” Kiara says, and Sarah looks at her. 

“You’re right, Kiara. What can she be mad at me for? She’s the hypocrite.” Sarah says, standing up a little straighter.

“Precisely.” Kiara agrees, and she hesitates a moment, wondering if she’s about to overstep her bounds. She takes a little bit of a breath. “Oh, and Sarah?” Sarah hums, turning to look at Kiara. “My friends call me Kie.” 

She doesn’t need to hold her breath for more than a millisecond - Sarah’s face breaks into a massive smile in absolutely no time. 

“Alright, Kie.” She says, beaming. 

  
  
  


“Miss Turtle Queen finally decided to grace us with her presence!” JJ says as the HMS Pogue arrives at the Carrera’s dock. Kiara had gone home to change after school, and then JJ and John B’s soccer practice had been cancelled, so she texted them to pick her up at the end of her dock. She had meant to see them on Sunday, but she was so exhausted from her day at the Turtle Hatch, she had slept straight through until noon, and then had been too lazy to get dressed and out the door. The boys had understood, and she needed the rest, but she was anxious to see them again after her day at school. 

“Yeah, yeah. I’m here. The party can begin.” Kiara says as she steps into the boat a little clumsy. John B hadn’t slowed the boat down quite enough for the move to be graceful, but Kiara wasn’t going to complain. JJ catches her hand when she’s about to fall. 

“How was it?” JJ asks as Kiara settles down into one of the seats. She flings a lunch box full of grapes onto the seat next to her, but both boys ignore the lunch box for the time being. They are fully invested in Kiara's weekend. 

“Terrible?” John B asks.

“Horrible?” JJ says, setting his elbows on his knees and resting his head in his hands like they are gossiping. 

“Did you want to stab your own eyeballs?”

“Decapitate a few Kooks?”

“Did they … take instagram pictures?” John B says, and the boys gasp. Kiara moves to shove JJ off the boat, but they are undeterred. 

“Oh, no, tell me it wasn’t performative activism!” JJ says, clutching at his heart.

“I hate you guys.” Kiara says, swatting at JJ with her towel. The boys break into laughter, but move out of range of her towel. “It was… ah, it was nice.” Kiara says finally, when the boys stop laughing and JJ reaches for the lunch box. 

“Nice?” JJ says, shocked, popping a handful of grapes in his mouth. “Kiara Carrera _enjoyed_ something? Oh my god, call the Pentagon. Declare a national holiday.”

Kiara waits for Pope to interject that _'t_ _he Pentagon doesn’t deal with national holidays’,_ but Pope’s not there. 

“Wait, where’s Pope?” She asks, turning around and looking behind her as if Pope is hiding somewhere on the boat. JJ and John B smirk at each other, and JJ throws a grape for John B to catch with his mouth. They both cheer when John B catches it.

“He’s auditioning for the school musical.” John B says while chewing his grape, and Kiara’s jaw drops. JJ throws another grape at John B, but he misses.

“What?” She says, flabbergasted. She had expected any number of weird after school activities - Pope had founded the Middle School Chess Club - but she had not expected that. “I didn’t know he liked musical theater.”

“Oh, he doesn’t." JJ says, laughing. John B shakes his head in laughter, and Kiara is confused. "But you get 15 points of extra credit on your final paper in Literature if you audition, and you know Pope.”

“Oh, okay. That makes sense.” Kiara says, nodding. Now that she knows the audition has a positive affect on his GPA, she's the opposite of shocked. It's the most in-character move Pope's ever made. The kid would shoot himself in the foot for one point of extra credit. “What’s the likelihood he gets a part?” 

“100%.” The two boys say in unison, and Kiara's jaw drops again. 

“They don’t cut anyone from the show.” John B explains while motioning for JJ to toss him another grape. “They haven’t in years.”

“So either he’s going to bail out of it in two weeks, or he’s going to be guilted into the ensemble of West Side Story.” JJ says, as John B catches another grape in his mouth. Kiara's silent for a minute, and then she can’t help but laugh. She'll support Pope in anything - she got kicked out of his chess tournament for being too supportive, for crying out loud - but Pope in a creative production? She can't believe it. His normal state of being is stilted, awkward, and borderline robotic. She can't even imagine how he'll perform on stage, reciting lines. If he had wanted to join musical theater because of a genuine interest, she wouldn't have found it funny - she would have told him it was the coolest thing in the world. But Pope hates dancing, and he's never sang on key to a song in his life - the fact that he's joining the musical for 15 points of extra credit is _priceless_.

“Oh, Pope.” She says, wiping at her eyes. “Sometimes I wonder how he gets caught up in these things.”

“Speaking of getting caught up in things, you never said how turtle day was.” John B points out, and Kiara sighs. As they approach the marsh, John B turns the boat a little too quickly, and JJ and Kiara have to shift their weight to keep from falling off the side of the boat. John B mutters an apology as they both sit back down. JJ holds up the grapes to show he saved them.

“I, uh, actually had a good time.” Kiara says finally, and both boys share a look. Sometimes, it can feel like an endurance test trying to get Kiara to give any sort of specific information. Both boys can tell that today is one of those days.

“Did you make a hippie friend?” JJ asks, figuring to go straight for the jugular in his line of questioning, and Kiara sighs. She motions for JJ to throw her a grape, and she catches it in her mouth before answering.

“Uh, yeah. I guess.” Kiara says after a minute, and JJ groans. John B reaches over to flick her on the side of her head, but she moves just out of reach.

“Oh my god, Kie, don’t make me claw it out of you. Just admit I was right and you made a friend!” JJ says, and Kiara rolls her eyes. She swats John B's hand away, and looks out into the water. 

“You were right, and I made a friend.” Kiara says reluctantly, hoping to end the conversation there. John B throws his head back and groans, and JJ takes her by the shoulders, forcing her to look at him.

“Kie, do I need to fucking interrogate you? Who’s your new friend? What’d you do? Could you please give us any details?” JJ says, and Kiara rolls her eyes. She wants to tell him to bug off, or to ask him why he's so invested in her friendships, but she already knows the answer to that question, and she's not ready to discuss their rant sessions in front of John B. 

“Uh, I made friends with, uh, Sarah.” Kiara says hesitantly, deciding that it's better to rip off the band-aid and see how the boys react now then drag it on and have the boys badger her for hours. Sure, she'll have to tell Pope again later, but at least this way JJ and John B will get off her tail. 

“Sarah?” JJ says dumbly, as if he can't believe it.

“Sarah Cameron?” John B says in the same tone, and Kiara cringes. 

“Yeah, kinda?” She says, and both boys burst out in confusion.

_“What?”_ They say at the same time, and Kiara wants to tell the boys they are overreacting, but she's not sure they are. The fact that she made friends with the Kook Princess is pretty monumental. 

“Yeah, I don’t know, we just kind of vibed on Saturday. And I sat with her at lunch today. She’s way cooler than you’d think she is.” Kiara says, trying to brush it off. JJ and John B must sense something in her tone, because they look at each other, their eyes wide in shock before John B turns to Kiara and shrugs. She misses their nonverbal conversation, but she does notice that the boys act suprisingly cool about the entire affair after that. 

“I always thought she was cool.” John B says, instead of commenting that Kiara's literally made friends with the spawn of Satan's little sister. 

“You always thought she was hot.” Kiara counters, and John B nods. 

“That too.”

“Is she like Rafe?” JJ asks, his shock wearing off and a little bit of hesitation appearing. He had pushed her to go to the turtle day, and if it results in something bad, that's going to be his fault. He doesn't want her to get caught up with any of the Kooks that are just going to give her a hard time.

“God, no. She’s great. She can’t stand Rafe.” Kiara says, and JJ relaxes a little. Maybe Sarah's a Kook, but he trusts Kiara's sense of character, and if she says Sarah's alright, he'll believe her. That also means he was right about Kiara making a hippie friend at turtle day - he sits back, placing his hands behind his head, looking proud of himself. 

“Look at me, Jonathan James Maybank, Friendship Matchmaker.” He says, and Kiara throws her towel at him. 

“Don’t get up on your high horse just yet, Maybank. It was just one lunch.” 

  
  
  


It’s not just one lunch - it’s everyday that week. When she sits next to Sarah on Tuesday, Sarah whispers to her _“please tell me you are free on Saturday.”_

“Uh, yeah, I think so.” Kiara says, even though she has no actual clue if she’s free or not.

“God bless - Caroline wants me to go to her house and I already told her we are having a sleepover. You can come, right?” Kiara doesn’t mention that it doesn’t really matter if she can come or not - they could just lie to Caroline. Caroline will never know if Kiara was actually at Tanny Hill or not. But Kiara finds herself agreeing, and then Sarah actually seems super excited about the sleepover. Kiara’s a little ecstatic too, if she’s being honest.

She’s also terrified about asking her parents. 

Kiara waits until Thursday to tell her parents. She knows how strict they are about sleepovers, and she really, _really_ doesn’t want to have her mom give the same interrogation to the Cameron’s that she normally gives Big John. She’s a bundle of nerves at dinner, picking at the bolognese her dad cooked. 

“Honey, are you okay?” Her mom finally asks, as Kiara twirls her pasta around her plate. “Do you not like the bolognese? I told your dad it would be bland without the pepper flakes.”

“It is not _bland,_ Anna. It’s _authentic._ ” Mike says, shoving a forkful of pasta in his mouth.

“Pepper flakes are _authentic.”_ Anna teases back, and Mike rolls his eyes. 

“ _Authentic_ to the Wreck.” He says through a mouthful of pasta. 

“Micheal Carrera, do not speak with your mouth full!” Anna says, turning away in disgust. Mike just smiles and winks at Kiara. When she doesn’t smile back, Mike gets worried. She normally loves joining in on ribbing on Anna’s etiquette rules. “Baby, you okay?” He says to Kiara, who takes a deep breath. 

“One of the girls at school invited me to a sleepover.” Anna inhales sharply; Mike exhales. Anna’s shocked - Kiara hadn’t mentioned any new friends at school. This is great news!

Mike’s just glad Kiara didn’t say something like _“one of the girls at school is bullying me.”_ Kiara’s not very open about what goes on in her school - Mike realizes that they shot themselves in the foot by forcing her to go to the Academy and arguing with her all summer. She won’t talk to them about anything anymore, but Mike could tell that school wasn’t exactly easy for Kiara. She had been withdrawn and subdue since school started, and he was almost ready to send her to the school psychologist for an evaluation just to make sure she was doing alright. The news about a new friend is good - he figured the first couple of months would be bad, but it must be going well if she has a new friend. 

“Oh, honey, that’s great! Who is it?” Anna recovers first, and Kiara shrugs her shoulders, trying to be nonchalant. She has every argument backed up in her head, ready to run through any of them in a moments notice - _they only live 5 minutes away; the Cameron’s are going to be home; it’s only going to be Sarah and me, and I’m pretty sure Rafe will ignore us; there’s no need to call her parents, they’re part of the Rhododendron Club and they’re always at the Island Club Parties; please, please, please don’t embarrass me, she’s the first friend I’ve made and I would prefer to keep her._

“Sarah Cameron.” Kiara says, and Anna drops her fork. 

“ _Sarah Cameron?”_ Anna barely breathes. “Ward Cameron’s daughter?” 

“Yeah, we met at the beach clean up and she invited me to her house. It’s only going to be us, and her parents will be home.” Kiara says, and Anna nods enthusiastically. 

“Of course, honey. We don’t mind at all.” Anna says, and Kiara’s about to launch into a discussion of how they _absolutely do not need to call her parents._

“Wait.” Kiara says, her arguments on the tip of her tongue. “What?”

“What? What do you mean?” Anna says, finally picking up her fork and trying not to beam. 

“I can go?” Kiara asks, and Anna nods. 

“Absolutely! When is it, Friday? We’ll get someone to cover your shift at the Wreck, won’t we, Mike?” Anna says, and Kiara’s _floored._ Not only are her parents letting her go to the sleepover, but they’re willing to let her off her shift at the Wreck? The last time she tried to get her Friday shift covered, her mom had complained for weeks about _responsibility_ and _work ethic._

“Uh, it’s Saturday, actually.” Kiara says, and Anna shrugs. 

“Well, we’ll find someone to cover on Friday anyways, just in case something comes up and you want to hang out with Sarah. There’s a football game Friday, isn’t there?” Anna says, and Kiara doesn’t even try to hide her shock.

“I’m not going to smother her, mom. She just invited me over on Saturday.” Kiara says, and Anna shrugs. 

“You never know what’ll come up.” Anna says, and Kiara looks at her dad in disbelief.

“You guys are serious? I can go? You don’t even want to, like, talk to Sarah’s parents?” Kiara says. 

“We don’t need to talk to Ward. He’s good people.” Mike says, and Kiara suddenly understands. She’s inflamed, for a second, at the implication that Ward Cameron is _good people_ because he’s rich, and by contrast, Big John is _bad people_ because he’s poor, but it’s overshadowed by how unbelievably easy this conversation was. She didn’t even need to break out her strongest arguments! She didn't need to break out any arguments!

The entire conversation is shocking enough that Kiara just accepts it, nodding her head and answering her mom’s questions about Sarah and their budding friendship. She’s been fighting with her parents every step of the way since 5th grade. It feels nice to have a breather for a second. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I finally went through and named all the chapters I have planned for this story so far, and I decided that I would put the name of the next chapter in the end notes as a little sneak peek for you guys. The next chapter is going to be title "A Slow Descent Into Kooklandia"


	9. A Slow Descent Into Kooklandia

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just to let you know how fun this chapter was to edit, I have 4 documents for it: Chapter 9, Chapter 9 rewrite, Chapter 9 re-rewrite, and Chapter 9 re-re-rewrite. Normally, I consider it a tough chapter to edit if I have to do a rewrite. The fact that I had a re-re-rewrite? Well, it’s a first for this story (nevermind that this chapter ended up being 15k words long).
> 
> I ended up using a new technique to edit this chapter because I wasn’t happy with the first 3 iterations, and I think I may adopt it as my go-to editing routine. If you guys notice anything different about this chapter (whether you like it or not), let me know! I’m not sure if the editing truly made as much of a difference as I think it did, and I want to know what you guys think.
> 
> I was going to split this chapter into 2 because I try to keep my chapters between 4k and 10k words, but I ultimately decided that I wanted this chapter to stay as one unit. I wanted to show very clearly that there’s a change in Kiara’s relationships from the beginning of the chapter to the end of this chapter, and how it happens over time.
> 
> Anyways, I hope you enjoy!

Looking back, it seems so obvious - apparently, hindsight truly is 20/20. Kiara and Sarah come into the world less like a rainstorm and more like a hurricane. It’s a matter of days before they are inseparable. Lunches become movie nights become weekend-long sleepovers and a near hostile takeover of the Environmental Club. Suddenly, everything becomes a _Sarah and Kiara_ thing _._ Hindsight says the friendship was never built to last - something that strong and powerful is only meant to end one way - but reality can be blinded by Sarah Cameron’s sunshiney personality.

Basking in Sarah Cameron’s sunshine does good things for Kiara - she sits with the popular kids at lunch, she always has a partner in Science or English, and the way the Kooks treat her fundamentally changes as Sarah’s new sidekick. The taunts disappear into thin air, replaced by friendly greetings in the hallway and casual invitations to parties. Kiara’s head spins from the complete turn in personality that the Kooks exhibit. 

More than that, Kiara likes Sarah Cameron - Sarah isn’t just a tool to bring Kiara popularity. Sarah doesn’t ever act like she’s saving Kiara - Sarah regularly acts exactly the opposite. She says Kiara’s supporting her through stupid Environmental Club politics or lunches that seem to drag on with gossip and ridicule. When the gossip gets too vicious, or the humor gets too dark, Sarah will look at Kiara and roll her eyes. It’s like they are both part of some larger inside joke. It’s enough to stop Kiara from vocalizing her arguments against the more problematic humor at the lunch table. It’s almost enough to quell her guilt. The prospect of sharing a joke with Sarah - just the two of them - is enough for Kiara to hold her tongue for perhaps the first time in her life. She feels blessed that Sarah Cameron has chosen her - everyone seems to want Sarah’s time, or friendship, or kindness, and she chooses to give all of those to Kiara for free. 

Miraculously, Kiara starts fitting in. 

  
  
  


\----------

  
  


“When do you think John B and Pope are gonna get here?”

JJ’s voice is almost enough to knock Kiara over. She tries to concentrate on her breathing, cycling her inhales and exhales to match the crash of the waves on the sand in front of her. She’s been steadily ignoring JJ for the last ten minutes, but he refuses to give her any peace. 

“I don’t know.” Kiara mutters, trying to maintain her breathing. She bends forward, moving from her standing position to place both her hands in front of her feet, the sand rough as it sticks to the palms of her hands. She bends and straightens her legs, feeling the muscles and tendons stretch as she lets her head fall forward. 

“They said 1:30 and it’s already 2:00.” JJ remarks again, and Kiara returns to resolutely ignoring him. They both know that Pope and John B could show up at any time - the length of a normal grocery run for Heyward is highly variable, and Kiara's no better at guessing at their arrival than JJ is. She breathes in one more time before planting her hands firmly in the sand, moving her feet back to bring her body to a high plank position. Her arms and legs shake as she tries to maintain her balance - the shifting sand under her arms and legs are not doing her any favors. She breathes out, bending her arms and lowering her body into chaturanga. 

“Did they text you - “

“JJ!” Kiara barks out as she collapses onto the sand, her arms giving out. “I’m trying to find my zen here!” 

She blows her hair out of her eyes, turning to face JJ. He has the audacity to look surprised by her outburst, as if it hadn’t been predicated by 10 minutes of passive aggressive yoga. 

“You don’t sound very zen.” JJ mutters, and Kiara resists the urge to reach out and hit him - that would be _very_ un-zen of her. 

“Obviously!” She shouts at him instead, turning her face away from him. She plants the palms of her hands by her ribcage and pushes her upper body off the sand, moving into cobra position. She had hoped to avoid covering herself in sand this time around, but Kiara supposes that’s what she gets for practicing without a mat and with a one man audience of JJ Maybank.

“Shut up and join me.” Kiara says after a minute, deciding the best punishment for JJ’s indiscretion would be stretching. 

“No.” JJ says without an ounce of hesitation. 

“Yes.” Kiara insists, her tone reminding JJ that she’s not kidding. 

“The sand …” JJ whines, gesturing vaguely to the ground in front of him. Kiara doesn’t open her eyes, but if her eyes had been open, she would have rolled them. 

“Luckily, there is an ocean 25 feet away that can take care of the sand for you.” Kiara says. JJ grumbles at her response, but she hears him move to lay down next to her. It’s silent for a second.

“What do I do?” JJ says, and Kiara cracks one eye open to see JJ doing a valiant but ultimately unsuccessful recreation of her own pose in the sand next to her. 

“Move your legs together. Unclench your shoulders. Lift your head up, close your eyes. Move your hands closer to your ribs.” Kiara says, watching out of the corner of her eye as JJ follows most of her instructions. 

“My ribs?” JJ asks, and Kiara moves her wrists around a little to indicate what she’s talking about. 

“Yeah, like mine.” She feels rather than sees JJ’s eyes on her, trying to figure out where his hands are supposed to be placed. Kiara figures that wherever his pose is now should be good enough - she closes her eyes completely and waits to hear JJ settle for a second. When she’s cycled her breath a few times, she speaks again. 

“Curl your toes under.” Kiara says, her voice taking on the kind of airy quality she hears in most of her yoga instructors. 

“Curl my toes under?” JJ’s voice is inquisitive, but softer than before. Kiara hums, and overemphasizes her change in footing as JJ watches. 

“Now you are going to put pressure in your toes and your hands and lift up, sending your hips backwards.” Kiara says, demonstrating the move in a fluid, solid motion. She doesn’t see JJ’s transition, but she can hear him shift in the sand. “This is downward dog.”

JJ grunts from next to her. “Kie, what the fuck do you have me doing?” 

JJ has a point - downward dog is normally a resting pose, a position Kiara goes to when she needs a break from her more complicated practices. The sand has transformed the move into an endurance test - maintaining her balance as the sand shifts beneath her hands and feet is a new and excruciating challenge. Kiara’s arms, strong from years of yoga practice, burn from the effort within seconds. 

“Calm down.” Kiara says, though she’s not entirely sure if she’s talking to herself or JJ. “Breathe with me. Inhale.” 

Kiara hears JJ following her instructions, and she contemplates her next move. Normally, she would hold her downward dog for five breaths, but she’s halfway certain her arms won’t make it that long. She decides to cut it short, and she rationalizes it by reminding herself that JJ is a beginner. 

“Exhale.” Kiara says, beginning her narration again. “Move your feet up to your hands - “

“My _hands_?” JJ’s voice is incredulous, and if Kiara didn’t find his confusion so endearing, she’d yell at him to stop repeating her instructions as questions. 

“Watch me.” Kiara says, moving her body easily from downward dog to standing fold in one step. JJ, by contrast, nearly takes both of them out in his movement. Kiara ignores his stumbles in favor of maintaining her zen. “Inhale, straighten your legs a little. Exhale, fold completely in half, let your head dangle between your arms. Inhale, sweep your arms up over your head - “ She says, standing up straight, narrowly avoiding JJ’s face as she circles her arms to above her head. JJ watches her intently, trying to mimic her movements.

“Place your hands together above your head, bring them down to heart’s center.” Kiara says, dragging her hands down into prayer position in front of her chest. JJ manages to match her movements without incident. “Inhale. Give gratitude to the ocean - “

“Give gratitude - “ JJ says, his voice incredulous.

“ _Give gratitude to the ocean.”_ Kiara says through her teeth, her voice sharp as she cuts off his teasing. JJ looks at Kiara quizzically, then at the ocean, and then back at Kiara one more time. She doesn’t move, her breathing coming more naturally as she stops narrating it. He realizes she must be serious. 

“Uh, thanks, ocean -” JJ starts, thinking he might as well give it a shot, before Kiara cuts him off again. 

“Not verbally.” Kiara’s voice is desperately trying to maintain the airy yogi vibes, and failing under JJ’s antics. 

“Not verbally? What do you mean _‘not verbally’_?” JJ lets his hands fall to his side as he turns to face Kiara more directly. He notices Kiara’s face breaking into a little bit of a smile as her eyes remain closed. “Are you messing with me?”

“ _No.”_ Kiara says, though her tone does little to convince JJ that she’s telling the truth. “You’re just being an idiot - stand with your hands at heart’s center and send positive energy into the world, dumbass.” 

JJ grumbles as he resumes his stance to match Kiara, missing the way her smile grows at his discontent. He plants his feet as he tries to _‘send positive energy into the world’_ , whatever that means. 

Kiara’s silent for another few minutes, and JJ gets anxious because he’s pretty sure that if he had any positive energy in his body to begin with, it definitely has exited by now. Kiara must sense his anxiousness, because right as JJ’s about to bug her to move on, she speaks again. 

“That’s known as a Sun Salutation.” JJ looks over at her, only to see that she has remained standing in the same position, her hands at heart’s center (JJ still isn’t really sure what that means), her eyes closed, and the remnants of a smile on her face. “Usually I do 4 or 5 of them in a row, but we could try something else if you want.”

“Nah.” JJ says, settling back into his stance to match Kiara. There’s no way he’s going to let her tease him about something called a _Sun Salutation_. “Let’s do 7.” 

“Oh, someone’s ambitious.” Kiara says, her voice taking on a teasing lilt. She breathes in once more, then begins narrating the moves again, moving herself and then JJ from pose to pose. 

Both of them are sweating by the time they finish the seventh round of Sun Salutations, and JJ’s cursing John B and Pope in his head for being so late. The mobility of the sand and the repetition of the poses has JJ’s muscles burning, but he won’t admit that to Kiara. She’s sweaty too, though, and JJ has a sneaking suspicion that she might know _exactly_ how he feels. Her last plank was pretty shaky. 

When she finishes her last round of ocean gratitude, she turns to JJ smiling. He can noticeably see that she is more at ease than when she arrived at the beach, and he realizes with a start that he is too. Whatever a Sun Salutation is, it has worked a miracle and made him a little more _zen_. He’ll never admit it to Kiara, and she smiles like she already knows. 

“Want to try something more fun?” She asks. 

  
  


“I said _slowly!_ ” Kiara yells, dodging JJ’s flailing feet. 

“ _Oof.”_ JJ grunts as his body collapses into a clump on the sand. “Kie - you were supposed to catch me!” 

“ _Catch you?_ JJ, I was _spotting_ you! How in the hell was I supposed to catch you and support your body weight!” Kiara says sharply, staring down at him as he sits up, shaking his head to get the sand out of his hair. “Do you want to try again?” She adds, after they are both silent for a moment. Her voice is significantly softer this time around, like her momentary blip from zen didn’t even happen. 

“Yeah.” JJ says, standing up slowly and trying dust the sand off of the rest of his body. “I think if I keep my arms straight, I can do it.”

“And if you kick up slower.” Kiara adds, moving to stand next to JJ, her hands ready to steady his back if he makes it that far. JJ nods, like he’s contemplating the form of the handstand, and he lifts his hands above his head like Kiara had shown him. She entered a handstand so gracefully, like her body was meant to be upright or upside down or twisted like a pretzel. JJ could mimic it - he had to be able to. She made it look easy. 

“What the fuck are you two doing?” Says a voice from behind the two of them as JJ starts to enter a handstand. JJ aborts the move at the last second, stumbling a little to turn and see John B and Pope approaching them. They both wear amused grins, and JJ can tell they saw him collapse in the sand not even five minutes ago. 

_“Yoga”_ Kiara responds at the same time JJ says _“Handstands.”_

“Kie made you do yoga?” Pope says, addressing JJ. JJ shrugs in response, like it’s not a big deal. Like he hasn’t spent the last 45 minutes in some weird, vaguely painful yoga moves that Kiara concocted. 

“Yeah, she threatened me.” JJ says, pointing his thumb at Kiara. Kiara lets out a short breath of laughter in response, crossing her arms over her chest.

“You liked it.” She counters, raising an eyebrow at him, daring him to argue with her when they both know she’s right. 

“It was very zen.” JJ concedes, deciding that arguing with Kiara would be futile. “Sent positive gratitude to the ocean or some shit.” He adds, because he can’t let Kiara go on thinking he enjoyed it too much. 

That statement garners a scoff out of Kiara, and JJ grins in response. John B is looking between the two of them, the confusion clear on his face, like he can’t imagine JJ sitting still long enough to enjoy yoga with Kiara. To be fair, JJ didn’t think he had it in him either. It’s a day of revelations. 

“Okay, well, now that you’ve done your … zen shit - ” John B says, gesturing towards the two of them and then vaguely towards the ocean “ - can we surf?” 

The three boys have been friends with Kiara long enough to know that she typically ends her _‘zen shit’_ by laying down on the ground and not moving for several minutes. She claims it’s a yoga pose, but JJ is at least 33% sure she’s just micro-napping. Whatever the case may be, the boys know better than to assume that Kiara’s done with her yoga practice. 

Kiara seems to contemplate it, and then she sighs like she’s giving up. “I can do shavasana later.” She says after a beat, and the boys look between themselves because they have no concept of what that means. JJ’s about to ask her for clarification when Kiara laughs, shakes her head and says, “That means we can go and surf.”

“Woo!” John B says, pumping his fist in the air, running back down the beach to where Kiara and JJ had dropped their boards prior to the impromptu yoga practice. Kiara laughs, racing him down the beach, while Pope and JJ turn to walk behind them. 

“Dude - “ Pope whispers, looking at JJ sincerely. “What does it mean to send positive gratitude to the ocean?”

“Bro, if I fucking knew.” JJ says, shaking his head. 

  
  
  


\----------

  
  
  
  


Ward Cameron hadn’t thought he would get his next great business venture from a fourteen year old girl sitting across from him at his dinner table, but he supposes there are worse places to garner inspiration. He isn’t entirely fond of the new girl Sarah has befriended - she reminds him a little too much of the childhood friendships that dissolved in his teenage years. He knows - or at least, he thinks he knows - that Sarah’s so enthusiastic about the friendship because him and Rose were not. When Sarah had said the daughter of the owner of the tourist trap by the bay was coming over for a sleepover, Ward had struggled to keep the displeasure out of his voice. Rose hadn’t said anything, but given Rose’s personality, a lack of questions only meant bad things. 

Ward knew that Sarah would react negatively when he proposed to Rose - he had planned for it, even. He had made sure valuables were secure, he stored his liquor and beer in locked cabinets, and he made sure that Sarah couldn’t sneak out of her third story bedroom. He had planned for Sarah to start drinking or sneaking out - he hadn’t expected Sarah’s rebellion to come in the form of the daughter of Anna Quinlen and her husband from the Cut. 

Rose and Ward agreed to be positive about Sarah’s friendship with Kiara in an effort to utilize reverse psychology - if Sarah thought that they loved Kiara, they wouldn’t stay friends for more than a week. Rose, however, seemed to be actually taken with Kiara once they met. Before Kiara was at the house, Sarah had demanded that her and Kiara eat pasta while the rest of the family had steak because _‘red meat is bad for the environment.’_ When Kiara got to the house, she had been horrified when she learned Rose was cooking a completely separate meal for her - she had apologized repeatedly, even offering to help Rose cook to make up for the complexity of her own meal. Rose had been hesitant at first, but once her and Kiara started working side by side in the kitchen, Rose was laughing genuinely. Ward could tell from Rose’s warm demeanor that she was no longer pretending to like Kiara, and that made Ward want to roll his eyes at his fiancee.

Halfway through dinner, after Kiara had wowed Rose with a story of nutella stuffed french toast, Ward broached the subject of boats. He heard Kiara discussing the Druther’s with Sarah when she first arrived at the house, complimenting the boat as Sarah dismissed it. When Kiara asks for the mashed potatoes, Ward hands them to her with a question of her experience with boats. 

“You been out on the water much, Kiara?” Ward says as she heaps a small mountain of mashed potatoes on her plate. 

“Oh yeah, Mr. Cameron. I boat around a lot with my friends from middle school.” Kiara says, setting the potatoes down on the table in between her and Wheezie. “I saw your boat out by the dock. It’s impressive.”

“Thank you, Kiara. I try to keep the Druther’s in good shape.” Ward says, smirking a little as Kiara mentions what Rose regularly calls his _‘pride and joy.’_

“I saw you updated the motors. Must run pretty fast now.” Kiara says offhandedly, as if she wasn’t revealing that she knew a lot more about boats than your average Joe. 

“Oh - you noticed?” Ward says, his voice clearly displaying his shock, and Kiara nods in response. “Yeah, runs about five or ten knots faster than it did before.” 

“ _Dad -”_ Sarah whines. Everyone at the table is sick of hearing about the Druther’s new engine, Sarah the most. She doesn’t want him to bore her friend with the details.

“That’s really impressive for a boat that big.” Kiara notes, picking at her pasta, shocking both Sarah and Ward. 

“Yes!” Ward says, looking at Rose and pointing at Kiara, as if Kiara just validated the several hours of work and thousands of dollars that went into the new motor. Rose quirks an eyebrow up at him, like she’s reminding him he didn’t want to like his daughter’s new friend. Ward ignores it. “I told you that was impressive!” 

“I never told you it wasn’t, honey.” Rose says dismissively, as if she hadn’t yelled at him for babying his _goddamn boat_ just two weeks ago. 

“The Druther’s new motors get no respect around here, Kiara.” Ward says mockingly. Kiara smiles slightly, before shrugging a shoulder. 

“I think the new motors are cool.” Kiara says, and Ward forgets all about his agenda to get rid of his daughter’s new friend. 

“Your friend thinks the new motors are _cool,_ Sarah.” Ward says, his voice teasing as he looks directly at her. 

“You’re so embarrassing, Dad.” Sarah says, rolling her eyes. Ward scoffs, brushing off Sarah’s insult before turning 

“So, how do you know so much about motors?” Ward says, directing his question at Kiara once again. Kiara pauses with a forkful of mashed potatoes halfway to her mouth.

“Uh, I’ve been working on my friend’s dad’s boat since fifth grade. I’m okay with a motor.” Kiara says, before sticking her mashed potatoes into her mouth. Ward doesn’t know what it is about her tone, but he can tell she thinks she is a lot better than _‘okay’_ with a motor.

“Since fifth grade, you said? What boat?” Ward still refuses to let Rafe turn on the air conditioning in the Druther’s, much less mess around with the motor. He can’t imagine anyone allowing a ten year old girl to handle a boat engine. Kiara looks hardly capable of handling a wrench now, much less as a fifth grader. 

_“The Island Bird._ It’s Big John Routledge’s boat.” Kiara says, and Ward tries to shuffle through his mental catalog of Island Club members to see if he knows anyone named John Routledge. He can’t recall a face outrightly, but something about the name is tugging on the back of his mind, telling him he recognizes it. 

“Hm, I’m not sure I’m familiar.” Ward says when he fails to come up with any form of solid recognition. “I usually know all the boats at the Yacht Club.” 

“Oh - “ Kiara says softly, coughing a little to cover up her awkward tone. “Um, he doesn’t dock at the Yacht Club. He’s at Pelican Marina.” 

Ward’s hand hesitates for a second as he cuts through his steak as recognition dawns on him. He still doesn’t know John Routledge from Adam, but he probably went to school with him in his younger years. It also makes sense that the only place they’d employ a ten year old girl to work on a motor would be the Cut’s marina. 

“Oh, okay.” Ward says, spearing a piece of steak. “What does John do with his boat? Is he a fisherman?”

“No.” Kiara says, and he can tell she’s contemplating how to continue the sentence. “He’s, uh, looking for the Royal Merchant.” Kiara says, twirling her fork in her mashed potato mountain. 

“The ship wreck?” Rose interjects from the other side of the table. Kiara nods towards Rose, and she scoffs indignantly. “That’s … ambitious.” 

“You think he’ll find the treasure?” Ward asks, his tone somewhere between dismissive and teasing. He knows about the treasure - everyone on the island knows about the treasure - but he didn’t know people still looked for it. 

“Yes.” Kiara says curtly, and Ward can tell that she’s taken some offense to his and Rose’s dismissal. More so than that, her tone holds a deeper reality - Ward thinks, from the way Kiara responds, that she may actually believe what she says. He contemplates for a second whether her belief is the high flung dream of a young high schooler, or an honest understanding of the reality of the situation. 

Rose moves the conversation on, sick of hearing about treasures she doesn’t believe in and motors she doesn’t care about. She talks to the girls about getting manicures while Ward mulls the conversation over in his head. Kiara had given no more information about the treasure, and she had made no move to defend her belief in John Routledge’s mission. In fact, it’s the very act of not defending her stance that causes the conversation to linger in Ward’s mind. She’s so sure of herself and John Routledge that she doesn’t need to seek approval from Ward or his family - that’s a tall order for a freshman in high school. The faith Kiara has in her friend’s dad starts a nagging in the back of Ward’s mind that he can’t ignore. It’s the same type of nagging that all Ward Cameron’s greatest accomplishments are preceded by - winning the Willard T. Bothwell Scholarship, getting a full ride to UNC, the start of his own construction company, and acquiring Tanny Hill. The pinprick of obsession is enough to drive him crazy and find his next path to success. 

When Sarah and Kiara go upstairs to watch a movie, Sarah apologizes for her dad being _‘so weird.’_ Ward smiles slightly as he overhears Sarah’s words, then he tells Rose he has a few hours of work to get to and disappears to his study to search the internet for the remnants of the Royal Merchant. 

Ward doesn’t leave his study until his eyes are bleary and Rose appears in his study, dressed in pajamas and informing him she’s going to bed. He leaves his computer reluctantly, but he settles into his nighttime routine certain of two things: the Royal Merchant fortune is still out there, and he’s going to find it. 

  
  
  


\----------

  
  
  


“Sorry! Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry!” Kiara yells as she sprints down the dock, each footstep punctuated by an apology. She makes it to the end of the dock, throwing a box of onion rings and then her own body over the side of the HMS Pogue as JJ drives the boat away from the dock as fast as he dares. 

Kiara tumbles, nearly breaking her ankle as she falls into the boat, John B’s arms stopping her from falling flat on her face on the deck. John B helps her stand straight as JJ pushes the upper threshold of the Pogue’s speed, giving her a look when she’s no longer in imminent danger of breaking her neck.

“I brought onion rings!” Kiara says in response to John B’s look, gesturing wildly at the box of onion rings she launched into the seat next to Pope. 

Pope stares back at her unimpressed. “It’s been forty five minutes.” He states, then he points to the box next to him. “That is one box of onion rings.”

“Thank you, captain obvious.” Kiara says, her chest heaving. She had been at the Wreck exactly seven minutes ago - a route that normally took just over 20 minutes by foot. She had spent the last hour and half with Sarah, throwing fries into each other’s mouths and complaining about school. She hadn’t heard her phone until the third time John B called, and by that point, she was already 30 minutes late to meet the boys at the end of her dock. She’s not even sure if she made sense as she rushed out of the Wreck, trying to convey to Sarah that she needed to get back to her house as soon as possible. Sarah certainly had looked confused, but Kiara was too focused on getting to the end of her dock before the boys left to pay much mind to it. 

“Those two things are not equal.” JJ says from his place at the wheel, and Kiara wants to hit him upside the head. She knows they aren’t equal, thank you very much. 

“Can a girl get a free pass?” She says as she sighs, hoping the boys will take pity on her and leave it be and not ask her why she was so late. It’s not like she’s the first one who’s ever been late to a meeting, or even the first one who’s been completely MIA from the group chat for no obvious reason. “I’m late one time - “

“By forty five minutes!” Pope says again, throwing his hands in the air. Kiara ignores him for a second, putting a hand on her stomach and trying to even her breathing. Maybe she needs to supplement her yoga with cardio because _wow,_ is she out of breath. 

“She brought onion rings, though.” John B says as he opens the box and shows the contents to both boys. They studiously ignore him. 

“Thank you!” Kiara says, as if John B proved her point. John B nods at her and winks, but the effect is lost when he shoves four onion rings in his mouth at once. 

“Not equal.” JJ mutters, cutting the boat around, heading towards the Chateau. 

“Not even a little bit.” Pope says, crossing his arms, and Kiara rolls her eyes. 

“Free pass?” She says, trying again to appeal to whatever good graces a group of 15 year old boys might have. John B holds out the box of onion rings to JJ, waving them in front of his face. 

“They’re warm.” He says, drawing out the word _warm_ in a sing-songy voice _._ JJ does his best to ignore him, but JJ _is_ just a teenage boy at the mercy of a box of warm onion rings. 

JJ swears, shoving one of his hands into the box of onion rings before plowing an obnoxious amount of them into his mouth. “Free pass.” He says dejectedly through the mouthful of onion rings, and Kiara smirks at him. She knows her boys.

Then, they all turn to Pope, who is still crossing his arms and glaring at Kiara. “I’ll take over Wednesday Tutoring Session this week?” Kiara says, cringing at the thought of tutoring JJ again but knowing it’s her best olive branch. 

Pope’s face splits into a maniacal grin as JJ yells _“fuck no!”_

“Alright, free pass in exchange for one Wednesday tutoring session.” Pope says, reaching out to shake hands with Kiara. 

“Man, I forgive you, and this is how you repay me?” JJ says, looking at Kiara as Kiara and Pope shake hands. “Y’all suck.” 

“You eat the onion rings, you reap the consequences.” Kiara says.

“Fuck your onion rings.” JJ says as he shoves another handful into his mouth. 

Kiara smirks, leaning back in her seat. It was easier than she anticipated to get the boys to forgive her - and she didn’t even have to admit that she missed the pre-planned meeting time because of Sarah Cameron. 

She doesn’t think the boys would be mad that she was with Sarah, but she also doesn’t want the boys to feel like they come second to Sarah. Sarah’s great, but she’s not the Pogues, and she doesn’t want any of the boys to get too caught up in the implications of Kiara hanging out with Sarah. She can keep the two separate identities she’s created - Kiara the Pogue, loyal to all ends to her boys and the Cut, and Kiara the Kook, Sarah Cameron’s lady in waiting. It will be fine. 

  
  


\----------

  
  
  


“Please.”

“No.”

“Please.” 

_“Sarah.”_

“Pretty please? Like, cherry on top, all that shit?” Sarah says, clasping her heads in front of her and focusing the full power of her puppy dog eyes on Kiara. 

“I already said no!” Kiara says, rolling her eyes. She doesn’t deny Sarah many things, but Kiara’s pretty adamant about this one.

“It will be painless!” Sarah promises. 

“I disagree.”

“ _Kiara.”_ Sarah whines. “I will literally never ask you for anything else in the world if you just let me give you a makeover for tonight.”

“That’s a bold face lie, Sarah Cameron. If I let you give me a makeover for tonight, it’ll open a can of worms.” Kiara rolls off of Sarah’s bed onto the floor to avoid the puppy dog eyes. She won’t last another five minutes under Sarah’s scrutiny, and she knows it. 

“Untrue. I would _never_ open a can of worms.” Sarah says seriously, and Kiara groans at Sarah’s deliberate misunderstanding.

“Why do you want to give me a makeover so bad?” Kiara says, pulling at the baggy t-shirt she has on. She knows it’s not the pits of fashion, but Sarah’s been pushing the makeover debate for well over an hour, and Kiara’s wondering if the baggy clothes actually offend Sarah. 

“Because you are so hot, and I have just the dress for you!” Sarah urges, but Kiara’s unconvinced. Sarah is _so hot_ , but Kiara’s not sure she falls into that same category. Any attempt at wearing Sarah’s clothes could end in tragedy. No one has ever accused Kiara of being particularly careful or elegant. 

“Kiara.” Sarah says, peeking her head off the edge of the bed to stare at Kiara on the floor. “We have _all day_ before the Island Club Party. What else are we supposed to do?”

“Watch movies, ride into town, go swimming - “

“Go _swimming?_ Before a _party?_ Kiara Carrera, tell me you are kidding.” Sarah’s voice is so aghast that Kiara just smiles like she was joking all along. In reality, Kiara’s not really sure what the problem would be with going swimming when she still has eight hours to get dressed, but she’s scared of the lecture she’ll get from Sarah. Better to just play along. 

It’s quiet for a minute before Sarah opens her mouth again. “Kiara - “

“God damn it, you stubborn child.” Kiara says, rubbing her hands down her face. “If I say yes, will you stop asking?”

“Yes! Yes, yes! Of course!” 

Kiara sighs. It might be a worthwhile offer - Sarah had been bugging her about the makeover all morning, and Kiara thinks that, at this point, the nagging might be worse than the actual makeover. If Kiara could shut her up, well, what does she have to lose? Except her dignity, maybe, but Kiara’s not even sure she has that. She has to go to the stupid party, and she has to dress up anyways. Letting Sarah give her a makeover would make both Sarah and Kiara’s mom happy - a real _two birds, one stone_ situation. As long as the boys don’t see her arriving at the party looking like a Kook Barbie, she’ll probably survive. 

Kiara takes a deep breath in through her nose. “Yeah, yeah. Okay.” Kiara says, rushing the words out of her mouth like she’s not sure she’ll get them out if she waits. 

“Okay?” Sarah repeats, her voice dumbfounded. Sarah had expected at least another hour of arguing - she can’t believe Kiara’s agreeing. 

“Yeah, I guess.” Kiara relents, and Sarah squeals loudly. Kiara doesn’t have time to prepare herself before Sarah is yanking her up to a standing position and crushing her in a hug. Kiara wants to be annoyed, but mostly, she’s just flabbergasted. Sarah’s already talking about skin tone and hair products and straighteners, her voice animated as she tumbles over the words. Kiara’s annoyance fades away the more Sarah acts like giving Kiara a makeover is the best thing in the world. 

“I have _just_ the dress! I know your mom bought you one, but honestly, I have this gold dress that will look _killer_ on you …”

The gold dress does look killer on Kiara, if she does say so herself. She stands in front of the mirror, running her hands over the drapey fabric of the dress Sarah had picked out. 

“Oh my god, I’m a magician. I’m a witch. This is amazing - I mean, I know I had good starting material, cause you are hot as-is, but Jesus, Kie.” Sarah says, admiring her handiwork from her seat on her bed. “You’re going to put some people at the Island Club into cardiac arrest.” 

“If you say something about an old white man finding me attractive one more time, I’m ripping this dress off and going for a swim in your pool.” Kiara says, turning around and glaring at Sarah. Honestly, it’s an idle threat. Kiara’s never had anywhere near as much makeup on her face as she does now, and although she firmly believes in natural beauty, Kiara’s not about to wash it off. It took a full hour for Sarah to get right, and Sarah’s got a point - Kiara does look hot. She’s never seen her eyes pop like they do covered with a little bit of eyeliner and mascara - it’s unnerving to see her face with this much makeup, but it doesn’t mean Kiara doesn’t like it.

Kiara might even love it. She finds that she feels powerful in a beautiful dress and fancy makeup - she never knew that about herself before. 

“By the way, you look hot as well.” Kiara says, turning back to the mirror so she can see the both of them clearly. Kiara’s not lying - Sarah’s outdone herself between the two of them. Kiara’s hair is straightened, flowing down her back and giving way to the material of the gold dress. The dress folds and drapes in the right places, looking like someone had designed it specifically for Kiara. She’s wobbly on the heels Sarah lent her, but she feels like a bad bitch in them and she refuses to take them off. 

Sarah’s pink-hued dress is as much of a show stopper - it flows to her feet, just barely showing Sarah’s toes and the heels she’s wearing. Sarah said she was going for a _woodland fairy_ look, and between her dewy makeup and her dainty flower crown, Kiara’s pretty sure she nailed it.

Looking at the two of them together in the mirror, Sarah sitting on her bed in her dainty woodland fairy ensemble and Kiara in her golden goddess dress, Kiara wants to paint a picture of them. She wants to paint a picture of them and hang it on every wall of her bedroom. 

“Hell yeah! We both look hot - we are going to _own_ the dance floor.” Sarah says, standing up and approaching the mirror. Kiara already feels like dancing - everything at the Academy, at home, and at the Island Club is so much easier with Sarah around. 

“I can’t wait to steal wine coolers from Mrs. Anderson.” Sarah nearly whispers as she approaches Kiara’s shoulder, lifting her phone to indicate she wants a picture. Kiara obliges to the picture, resting her head on Sarah’s shoulder and smiling. 

  
  
  


\----------

  
  


Pope’s the first to notice Kiara pulling away. 

He thinks the other boys don’t notice, or care, because they don’t pay attention. If there’s one thing Pope prides himself on, it’s his ability to pay attention. 

And he’s been paying attention. Since Kiara went to the turtle hatching, she’s been slowly prying herself out of obligations with the Pogues and pouring herself into Sarah Cameron’s social life. The other boys don’t mention it and Pope tends to believe they don’t see it. 

Maybe Pope notices it because he’s the most observant. Given that his competition consists of JJ and John B, he’s _absolutely_ the most observant. Maybe Pope notices because he’s the most likely to believe she would ditch them - he knows that Kiara was with Sarah when she was late to the docks, and he knows she doesn’t have as many shifts at the Wreck as she claims to have. He sees it sometimes, when she stops herself from saying something around the boys, or when she shows up late on a Sunday afternoon, looking like she spent the night before sleeping on Sarah Cameron’s floor. 

Maybe he recognizes it because he’s a little closer to the Island Club’s elite than the other boys. He’s privy to their secrets because his dad is catering, and he’s used to coming to events like these and watching the Kooks mingle and pretend like they like each other. It’s not particularly unnerving to Pope - he’s been doing it for as long as he could help his dad - but it's weird to watch your best friend fall victim to their games. 

Sometimes he wonders if he’s just jealous about the scholarship. He’ll wonder if he’s concocting crazy ideas in his head. When he is sitting across from Kiara in the boat, or next to her at the fire, or trying to talk their idiot best friends out of their latest scheme, Pope can convince himself he’s crazy. He rationalizes it in any number of ways, but the most convenient way is his own personal vendetta against the Academy. He was denied a scholarship and his dream of going to the elite private school. His best friend is able to go by virtue of her parent’s bank account, and she’s starting to not hate it as much as she once had. His own anger at the inequity of the Academy manifests itself by convincing him that Kiara is slowly abandoning them. He’s going crazy because Kiara’s not unhappy. 

Sometimes, in the darkest part of his mind, he thinks everything was easier when Kiara hated the Academy. She still hates the Academy, but not in the same way. Now she loves Sarah Cameron, and Sarah Cameron is integral to the Academy. It was much easier to be neutral about the Academy when Kiara hated it all - now that she doesn’t hate it, Pope finds it much more difficult to be maintain any sense of neutrality. Every time Kiara complained about the Academy, it was a reminder that Pope lucked out by going to the public school. Now that Kiara is talking about the fun she has with Sarah, Pope can’t help but resent her tenure at the Academy.

Maybe he recognizes it because Kiara comes over to him at the beginning of the party, and they talk for a quick second, but that’s it. Normally, Kiara spends half of the party trying her best to distract Pope from his work. At the Harvest Party, she says hello, asks if him or his dad need any help, and when her offer is turned down, she disappears back into the crowd. Pope catches glimpses of her in the crowd - giggling as Rafe says something, dancing with Scarlett, or stealing wine coolers with Dennis. She flits around the party, the only constant in her movements being Sarah Cameron. They two of them don’t leave each other’s side the whole night, and Pope watches them conspire and dance and laugh their asses off when one of the wealthier, older men on the island spills a martini down his shirt. 

Maybe it’s because Kiara doesn’t invite any of her new friends over to meet Pope. It’s not like he necessarily wants to meet them, and he definitely would prefer to meet them when he’s not in catering clothes, but the fact that she doesn’t even try is far more telling than Pope would like to admit. Sure, maybe she knows he doesn’t want to talk to them, or that he won’t appreciate making small talk with a rich asshole who attends his dream school and has a 1.3 GPA. Maybe Kiara is thinking of him by keeping her Kook friends at bay. Pope’s still not entirely convinced. 

Pope doesn’t want to be an alarmist, but he thinks he can see the writing on the wall. Kiara’s finally accepting her place among the Kooks - it’s only a matter of time before her Pogues are written out of her story. Maybe this ending was inevitable. Maybe the Pogues were always meant to fall apart. 

It feels like they’ve already fallen apart when Kiara stumbles, drunk and leaning heavily on Sarah, out of the party. She’s headed for Rafe Cameron’s Jeep, and then probably Tanny Hill, where she’ll sleep off the alcohol and wake up to a four course brunch and a lounge by the pool. 

Pope’s almost resigned to the fate of the Pogues as he watches her walk away. She hadn’t said goodbye to him, she hadn’t paid him anymore mind after their brief conversation at the beginning of the party. As he watches her retreating figure, it feels like they’ve always been this broken. 

Pope doesn’t mention it to the boys.

  
  
  


\----------

  
  
  


Kiara doesn’t want to say that Sarah influenced her fashion choices, but her new love affair with a straightener and a growing collection of crop tops would say differently. Sarah starts by handing Kiara a few cast offs from her closet on the night of the Harvest Party, and then Kiara realizes that Sarah’s got a point - underneath the scowls and baggy clothes, Kiara is kind of hot. She’ll take what she can get, and she embraces Sarah’s uniform of cut off jeans and crop tops. 

She completes the look on her birthday - Sarah stands in the middle of the crowded hallway, holding out a small box wrapped in brightly colored wrapping paper. She looks almost sheepish as Kiara takes the box. 

“Happy Birthday!” Sarah says brightly, and Kiara smiles at her. 

“You really didn’t have to-”

“Shut up, Kie. It’s your birthday, I got you a present. Open it!” Sarah says, urging Kiara to tear into the wrapping paper enthusiastically. 

“Alright, alright.” Kiara says, smiling as she tears into the present. 

It’s a small black box that Kiara opens to reveal a thin gold necklace with a _‘K’_ pendant. It matches Sarah’s _‘S’_ necklace, the one that has hung around Sarah’s throat everyday that Kiara has seen her. 

Kiara can’t help herself - she gasps out loud. She had ranted and raved about the uniformity of those necklaces, about the lack of individuality or meaning they convey, when she started at the Academy. Now, the necklace feels like a sense of belonging. It feels like Sarah is announcing that Kiara’s one of them, like Kiara belongs in any room or any group that Sarah’s a part of. Maybe it’s a silly necklace that doesn’t mean that much, but Kiara can’t squash the feeling that the necklace gives her. She loves it instantly. 

“See! It matches!” Sarah says, pointing to her own necklace, as if Kiara wasn’t acutely aware of that fact. “Come on, I’ll put it on for you in the bathroom!”

The bathroom is blessedly empty when Sarah drags her through the door, placing Kiara in front of the mirror and taking the delicate necklace from the box. She drapes the necklace around Kiara’s neck, flipping Kara’s hair over her shoulder to avoid the clasp. 

Kiara’s silent as Sarah struggles with the clasp, dragging her fingers lightly across the surface of the pendant. Maybe the necklace doesn’t scream uniqueness or individualism. No, instead, when she sees Sarah’s matching necklace through the mirror, it feels like she belongs somewhere. 

“I love it.” Kiara says, realizing she hadn’t thanked Sarah since she opened the box. Sarah drops her hands from Kiara’s neck, having clasped the necklace, and Kiara wants to say something else. She wants to say anything, but all the words she searches for feel wrong. Instead, Kiara turns around, crushing Sarah in a hug. She’s desperate not to cry this early in the morning, but it feels like she might be close. 

\----------

  
  
  


JJ’s the next Pogue to notice a serious change in Kiara’s behavior, and it’s only because he had been actively monitoring her since that day in the HMS Pogue when Kiara had spilled her guts about how miserable she truly was. He had spent weeks paying extra attention to her words, making sure she was eating, and encouraging her to get out of her house and try to talk to some people, and he was pleased to see that she wasn’t displaying any negative warning signs. It had been a few weeks of calm waters and then, ever so slowly, she began pulling away from him just the slightest bit. It started by her claiming to be busy at the Wreck more often, and then a few cancelled plans. She started to act less and less emotional when she was ranting to him, and then the rants became less common, and then they stopped altogether. It wasn’t like JJ to stick his nose where it didn’t belong - god knows he’s smarter than that - but he’s honestly a little terrified. He’s terrified that he missed a warning sign, and that Kiara’s struggling with something. He’s terrified that this is her call for help, and he’s missing it completely. 

He’s not built for this type of emotional distress. When Kiara comes up to him, ranting and raving about how miserable she is, that’s easy. She seeks him out, she begins the conversation, she decides the topics. All JJ has to do is sit and listen to her - there’s nothing active from his side, and there’s very little he can mess up when he gives her the reins. He just needs to listen and nod and not invalidate her feelings. 

But approaching her about said feelings? God, no. There’s so much he could mess up, there’s so many wrong things he could say. He’d rather punch something and make Kiara’s bad feels go away, but he can’t figure out _what_ to punch. 

He gives her a few days to reach out to him, but then he decides that enough is enough. The only thing that scares JJ more than calling her out is losing her. He needs to talk to her before she spirals into something he can’t help her with. 

He texts her on a Friday night, right at 9:30, when he knows her shift at the Wreck is ending. Her mom and dad won’t be home until well after 11:00, so he has some leeway in the schedule to verbally duke it out with her before they get home. An hour or so, maybe more if he’s lucky. He’s pretty sure it’s not enough, but it will have to do. 

  
  


**_Jonathan James Maybank_ **

_u home?_

**_Kie Carrera_ **

_No? Why?_

**_Jonathan James Maybank_ **

_u aren’t home? still at the wreck?_

**_Kie Carrera_ **

_No, stalker, I’m at Sarah’s_

**_Jonathan James Maybank_ **

_o, ok. when r u gonna b home?_

**_Kie Carrera_ **

_Your shorthand is going to kill me._

_Um, I don’t know. What’s up?_

**_Jonathan James Maybank_ **

_nothing, just wanted to talk_

**_Kie Carrera_ **

_oh my god, JJ Maybank wants to talk about his feelings?!_

**_Jonathan James Maybank_ **

_shut up_

**_Kie Carrera_ **

_I’ll be home in 5_

  
  
  
  


“You dragged me home from Sarah’s to ask if I’m _suicidal?”_ Kiara says, stunned. She’s looking at JJ, her mouth agape, while he looks anywhere but her. When she got home and let JJ into her house, she hadn’t imagined this was where the conversation was going to go. “Actually, you know what, that’s pretty emotionally intelligent for you. Honestly, I’m a little impressed.” Kiara says after a second, contemplating this newest plot twist. She leans back against the wall of her closet, staring at her best friend.

“Kie, I’m being serious.” JJ says, sitting down on the edge of her bed carefully. He hates this. He hates everything. He hates her pink room and her lavender diffuser that is supposed to be calming but makes him feel like he’s choking. He hates the way she’s brushing off, he hates the fact that they are even having this conversation. He just wants everything to go back to the way it was before, before Pope lost the scholarship and John B started fighting with Big John and Kiara got shipped off to a new school. Things were so much easier then. 

“And so am I. I am _not_ suicidal, JJ.” She says firmly, and it’s almost enough to get him to believe her. He wants to believe her, because that’s so much easier, but…

“Okay, so then, how come you haven’t talked to me in, like, two weeks?” JJ says, standing up to pace the floor in front of Kiara. He runs his hands through his hair, and he wants to rip it out when Kiara rolls her eyes. 

“JJ, what are you talking about? We’ve talked everyday! I’ve literally sent you a daily horoscope every morning. Wait - “ She pauses for a minute. “Have you been _ignoring_ my daily horoscope? JJ - I work hard on those! Do you have any idea how _specific_ those are?! I practically had to hack the hospital to find your Rising Sign.”

“No, of course I read those.” He absolutely does not. “I mean you haven’t talked to me about the real shit. Like, your feelings, and the Academy, or whatever.” 

“Oh.” Kiara says when it dawns on her what JJ’s talking about. She has been ranting and raving, but her audience of choice for the last couple of weeks has been Sarah. She hadn’t purposefully been migrating her rant sessions from JJ to Sarah, but she sees that it’s happened.

Kiara almost feels bad - seeing JJ worried, pacing around her room is enough to make her feel guilty. But, honestly, JJ has never been comfortable with the type of emotional luggage Kiara’s been carrying. Asking him to listen to her rant, to share the burden of the dark thoughts that sometimes cross her mind, is unfair. She’s doing him a favor by talking more to Sarah - Sarah’s better equipped to handle the emotional leg work, and she understands more about what Kiara’s going through. Sure, Sarah's never been the outcast at the Academy, but she knows the Kooks and their passive aggressive tendencies. Sarah and Kiara go to the same school, so _of course_ Sarah understands the trials and tribulations of the Academy better than JJ does. Kiara’s doing JJ a favor. Or, at least, that’s what she tells herself when JJ’s face falls as she says “I’ve just been hanging out with Sarah more, and we’ve been talking. You know, cause she goes to the Academy and stuff.”

“Yeah, yeah, sure.” JJ says quickly, trying not to look like the complete idiot he is. No, Kiara’s not suicidal - he’s just getting replaced by the Kook Princess. He’s feels like such a fucking loser. “Yeah, Sarah probably understands more about the Academy shit anyways.” 

“Yeah, you know, all the gossip and stuff.” 

“Yeah, the gossip.” JJ’s happy that Kiara’s not spiraling, but it still feels like shit. “Um, anyways, now that we’ve talked, I need to go back to the Chateau.” JJ’s already headed towards the doors. The air in Kiara’s room is so awkward it’s stifling, and the fucking lavender diffuser isn’t helping. He needs to get out of this house. Now. 

“Wait - really? So soon?” Kiara moves from leaning against the way, wringing her hands together. 

“Well, I mean, it’s probably better that I’m not here when your parents get home.” JJ says, trying to come up with any excuse that gets him out of the house. He nearly curses when Kiara shakes her head. 

“Nah, they’re out of town.” Kiara says, and the shock JJ feels at that statement is enough to quell his anxiety. Kiara’s parents left her alone? And the Pogues didn’t know?

“Oh?” Is all JJ says, trying to figure out if he’s actually gone insane or if Kiara was really all alone for the weekend. 

“Uh, yeah, they’re anniversary is coming up. Twenty years.” Kiara says, adding jazz hands for effect. “They went to the Bahamas.” She adds as she realizes she never told the boys her parents were leaving. Honestly, it was a little bit of a last minute trip, and it slipped her mind to bring it up. 

“Shit, Kie, and they left you with the house to yourself? Did your parents get abducted by aliens and have a complete change of personality?” JJ’s stunned, because a move like this is completely out of Kiara’s parents' character. They won’t let her leave the house without a full background check on her friends - leaving her alone in the house is definitely new. 

“Probably. They’ve been weirdly chill lately.” Kiara doesn’t mention that her parents fully expect her to spend the entire weekend at Sarah’s house. 

JJ nods, but if Kiara’s parents are being chill, this is the first time he’s heard of it. “I can’t believe they trust their little Kie to run the house by herself.” He says after a minute, and Kiara rolls her eyes. 

“Well, without my parents, I have the living room television to myself.” She states, wringing her hands one more time. “We could watch a movie.” 

JJ nods, hesitantly at first and then more enthusiastically. Kiara’s the only Pogue with Netflix, and JJ’s prepared to take advantage of that. “Can I sit in your dad’s fancy chair?” JJ asks, because he’s never been able to sit in Mike’s barcalounger, but he has dreams that it will be amazing. 

“Sure.” Kiara says, shrugging one shoulder as she moves to the door of her bedroom. She knows she might have hurt JJ’s feelings when she told him that Sarah was her built in therapist now, but hopefully a movie night will fix that.

“And popcorn?” JJ says hopefully, following Kiara as she leaves her room. 

“Would it be a movie night without it?” Kiara says, and JJ fist pumps his way down the stairs. “But I choose the movie.” 

JJ contemplates it for a second, before raising an eyebrow at Kiara. “Can I choose the genre?” 

“Absolutely not.” Kiara says with no hesitation, turning to face JJ at the bottom of the stairs. “I am not watching a horror movie.” 

Kiara’s got a lot of bravado, but she will not watch scary movies. She watched the Blair Witch Project with JJ and John B in sixth grade and didn’t sleep properly for three weeks. She’s not keen to ever repeat it. 

“I wasn’t going to choose horror movies.” JJ says, lying through his teeth as he comes to stand in front of Kiara. He was _absolutely_ going to choose horror movies, but he doesn’t want Kiara to know she was right. 

“Right. Yeah, I’ll believe that when you stop trying to show _The Conjuring_ to Pope.” Kiara says, brushing by him to enter into her kitchen. 

JJ turns to follow her, throwing his hands up. “He’s named after a priest! He should know the deep, dark dangers that exist in the world!”

“He’s not named after a priest - “

“The Pope is a priest - “ 

“I feel like that’s an under exaggeration - “

“But it’s not wrong.” JJ says as he grabs a bowl from one of the shelves Kiara can’t reach. He hands it to Kiara as she throws a bag of popcorn in the microwave. “Technically.”

“Only on the most technical of technicalities.” Kiara counters, rolling her eyes. She punches in time to cook the popcorn, before turning around to face JJ. 

“Action movie.” JJ offers after minute, and Kiara ponders for a second. 

“New movie. None of your classic shit.” She amends, and JJ nods. “And if the movie doesn’t pass the Bechdel Test, I’m vetoing it.” 

JJ rolls his eyes like he expected anything else. “You’re picking the movie, Kiara, you don’t have to veto shit.” 

“I’m just telling you now so that you can prepare yourself for at least a minuscule amount of feminism.” Kiara says, smiling and turning to get a bottle of iced tea out of the fridge. 

JJ wants to remind Kiara that they have been friends for five years, and he’s more than comfortable with large amounts of feminism, but Kiara cuts him off by tossing him a soda. 

“Kill Bill.” She states as she stands up from the fridge.

“I wouldn’t call that a new movie, but I’m down. We’ll have to watch both parts tonight.” JJ says, opening his soda and chugging half of it in one go.

“I’ll make extra popcorn.”

“Done deal.” 

  
  


Fifteen minutes before the end of the first movie, Kiara’s phone buzzes.

“Shit.” Kiara says when she sees her mom’s contact picture. “Can you pause it?”

JJ obliges as quickly as he can figure out the television, and Kiara slides her thumb across the screen to answer her phone. 

“Hey, mom.” Kiara says as innocently as she can. 

“Kiara? Why are you not at Sarah’s house?” Anna says, and Kiara pauses for a second, blinking her eyes. 

“Mom, are you _tracking me?_ While you’re in the Bahamas?” She says, exasperated. She knows her parents can be a lot, but this is a whole new level of crazy. 

“Don’t talk back to me, young lady. Why are you at the house?” Anna practically yells through the phone, and Kiara bites her tongue. She doesn’t want to get into a fight with her mom now. JJ looks at her, concerned, but Kiara brushes it off. 

“Sarah and I stopped by to pick up some clothes.” Kiara lies, trying to smooth over the situation. 

“At 11:30 at night?” Anna asks, her disbelief clear in her voice. Kiara groans. 

“Yes, mom. I forgot pajamas.” Kiara says, cringing as the lie tumbles from her mouth. JJ looks away from her. 

“You couldn’t have borrowed pajamas from Sarah?” 

“ _Mom.”_ Kiara says sternly. “I’m not wearing Sarah’s pajamas for the entire weekend. Rafe drove us over, and Sarah and I were just about to leave to go back to her house.” 

“Oh.” Anna says. “Oh, okay. That’s fine, I guess. As long as you weren’t wondering around. Are you headed back to Sarah’s soon?” 

“Yeah, in a few minutes.” Kiara says, breathing a sigh of relief that her mom bought the lie.

“Alright, well, tell Sarah and Rafe I said hi.”

“Yes, mom.” 

“I’ll call you in the morning - I want to FaceTime you so you can see the ocean. It’s amazing.”

“Yes, mom.” 

“Obviously, you couldn’t see that water now. You know, because It’s dark and everything. But it’s beautiful. 

“I miss you too, Mom.” Kiara says, smiling at her mother’s rambling. Anna laughs back through the phone. 

“Alright, I guess I am a little bit attached. I’ll talk to you tomorrow, honey. Dad says goodnight.” 

Kiara says goodnight to both of her parents and hangs up her phone, placing it down on the couch where it had been before the call. She expects JJ to start the movie right away, but he doesn’t move to pick up the remote. She looks at him, nudging his chair with her foot. “Hey, I’m off the phone. We can start the movie again.” 

Kiara’s getting ready to settle back into her slouching position on the couch when JJ springs up from the recliner. “I should probably walk you back to Sarah’s.” JJ says suddenly, stuffing his hands deep into his pockets.

Kiara looks up at him, shocked. “What? No - JJ, there’s only fifteen minutes left. We still have a whole other movie! The Bride - “

“You’re parents aren’t going to be happy if they find out you’re watching a movie with me.” JJ says sharply, moving towards the door. Kiara tries to sit up on the couch, but only succeeds in nearly tumbling off the side. 

“They won’t know, they are going to bed. I’ll go to Sarah’s after the movie is over.” JJ shakes his head, barely even turning to look at her. 

JJ loves stirring up trouble, he loves sneaking around and creating mischief. But something about sneaking around with Kiara, when she’s telling her parents she’s with _Rafe_ of all people, does not sit right with him. He knows Kiara’s parents don’t approve of him, and he knows that if she had said she was watching a movie with him, they would have hopped on the first plane back to Kildare and beat his ass for talking to their daughter. He knows all these things, but it still sucks that _Rafe Cameron_ is socially acceptable and _JJ Maybank_ is not. He doesn’t like to be reminded of it, especially when Kiara is choosing to spend more and more of her free time with the Rafe Cameron’s of the world. 

“Nah, I think we should go now.” 

“JJ - “ 

“Just in case, you know. Wouldn’t want to disappoint them.”

“JJ, what the _fuck?”_

“I’ll meet you outside.” JJ says, pushing the front door open and walking onto the porch. “Don’t forget your pajamas.” He throws over his shoulder before the door closes behind him. 

Kiara has no idea what just happened. 

  
  


The walk to Sarah’s house is silent except for the obnoxiously loud flip flops Kiara decided to wear. The frantic _flip-flop_ of her shoes as she struggles to keep up with JJ’s long limbs sounds daunting in the cool night air, and Kiara searches desperately for something to say. She wants to turn JJ around and ask him what the fuck just happened, but he hasn’t so much as looked at her since they left her front yard. She wants to ask him what his problem is, but she’s also scared to know the answer. 

JJ only stops his brisk walk when he’s at the end of Tanny Hill’s driveway. He had been to Tanny Hill before - once on a field trip, once during the dare with Travis, and he passes by regularly on his way to odd jobs around Figure Eight. The mansion had always been massive - it was a monstrosity of southern charm, fenced in by an imposing stone wall. Tonight, the building looks even more imposing than normal. The thought that Kiara now spends more time roaming the halls of this behemoth than she does lounging around the Chateau makes JJ feel uncomfortable. The house feels like it could swallow JJ whole. 

“This is Sarah’s place.” Kiara says unnecessarily, and JJ bites his tongue to refrain from saying _no fucking duh._

Kiara looks at him, and she’s halfway tempted to leave him in the middle of the street without any other communication. If he wants to be a child, she’ll let him. 

But she knows that if the situation were reversed, JJ wouldn’t leave until he knew what was bugging Kiara. He’d badger her until he got the answer. The least she can do is try to talk to him. 

“JJ,” She starts, trying not to sound as desperate as she feels. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing’s going on.” JJ says too quickly. He wishes it were true. “You just need to be at Tanny Hill so your parents don’t freak out.”

“JJ - “ Kiara says, and he already knows she doesn’t believe him. 

“Look - “ He says, cutting her off. “If you get grounded because you were lying to them, we won’t be able to hang out for weeks, and I don’t want that.” It’s only partially the truth. “Now, can you please get your ass inside this ungodly plantation house so I can see you next week?” He says, finally turning to look at her. He hopes the smirk on his face is masking his anger. 

Kiara doesn’t buy it right away. She hesitates another second, searching his face for any sign that he is pissed off about something. “So - we’re good?” She says wearily. 

“We’re always good, Kie.” JJ says, and he almost means it. 

It’s dark enough that Kiara can’t really read his features, but she takes him for his word. She tugs him down into a quick, tight hug, and then she’s taking off down the driveway, stage whispering _goodnight_ to him as she makes her way up to the mansion. 

He waits until Sarah opens the front door and lets Kiara in before he heads back to the Chateau. 

  
  


\----------

  
  
  


“I kinda want to introduce you to the guys.” 

Kiara’s sitting on Sarah’s bed, her back against the elaborate headboard. She plays with the fringe on Sarah’s comfiest blanket as she speaks to the closed door of the closet. 

“The Popes?” Sarah yells through the door, and Kiara laughs and rolls her eyes. 

“The _Pogues._ ” She corrects, laughing. “Like the type of fish. Pope is a Pogue, though, so you get half credit.”

“Pope is a Pogue.” Sarah repeats, opening the door to her closet. “Got it.”

“So are JJ and John B.” Kiara offers, motioning for Sarah to do a spin in Dress Number 3. “I like this one.”

“You’ve said that for the last three dresses!” Sarah whines, stomping her foot. 

“They all look the same!” Kiara says defensively, and Sarah huffs, turning around to look in the mirror. Okay, so maybe Sarah does have a few too many floral sundresses - sue her. 

“And all the Popes - “

“ _Pogues_ , Sarah.” 

“Sorry - all the _Pogues_ have confusing names.” Sarah says, putting her hands on her hips and turning around to look at Kiara. 

“Seriously? Sarah, two of them are named John.” Kiara says, throwing her hands up. 

“Exactly my point! How can I tell them all apart when I meet them? If they all have the same name, I won’t be able to differentiate!” 

“You are going to talk to me about not being able to differentiate? I had to sit at a dinner party with Tiffany, Jessica, and Caroline and tell them apart. Don’t come at me with your bullshit.” Kiara says, but she’s laughing. Sarah snorts at that. 

“Oh my god, I literally can not believe your parents wanted you to be friends with _Caroline_.” Sarah flops down on the bed next to Kiara, giggling. “I can’t even imagine you two talking.”

“Yeah, we didn’t do much talking after I yelled at Tiffany.” Kiara admits, cringing slightly at the memory. 

“Tiffany’s a bitch.” Sarah says simply, and she means it. Kiara’s laughs outrightly at Sarah’s disgust. Sarah didn’t have any problems with Tiffany or Caroline before, but ever since Kiara told her the story of the absolutely _dreadful_ dinner party she had to go to, Sarah had been less than ecstatic to sit at the same lunch table as them. “Imagine if you had dinner here that night. It would have made the beginning of the year so much better.” Sarah adds after a beat of silence. 

“Yeah, I might not have been miserable.” Kiara adds, moving down to lay next to Sarah on the bed. They both stare at Sarah’s ceiling for a moment. 

“Nah, you still would have been miserable. _I_ was miserable. Sitting with Olivia at lunch can do that to you.” Sarah says, and Kiara’s struck again by the flabbergasting realization that she’s saving Sarah as much as Sarah’s saving her. It’s still so odd to Kiara that she’s saving the Kook Princess from her own boredom. 

“We sit with Olivia now, though. And I’m not particularly miserable.” Kiara amends, and Sarah contemplates that for a second. 

“That’s a fair point. I guess the two of us cancel out her personality.” Sarah says, looking over at Kiara. Kiara continues looking up at the ceiling, letting out a short laugh at Sarah’s words.

“Thank fucking god.” Kiara says, and Sarah laughs at her tone. Sarah sits up, hopping off her bed and heading back towards her closet. 

“What do you think of this one?” Sarah says, prompting Kiara again, and Kiara considers it for a moment. She tilts her head to the side as Sarah spins around. 

“Alright, you definitely need to wear the second dress.” Kiara decides. “This one screams _I Go To Church Every Sunday._ ” 

“I do go to church every Sunday!” Sarah says indignantly, turning to look at Kiara with narrowed eyes. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I’m just saying, you probably don’t want to remind your boyfriend of that on your first date.” Kiara says, wagging her eyebrows at Sarah. Sarah picks up the nearest pillow and chucks it at Kiara’s head. 

“Maybe I do.” 

“Yeah, you want to talk about the Gospel on your date?” Kiara sends the pillow flying back to Sarah, who catches it before letting out a sigh.

“Yeah, okay. Second dress it is.” Sarah says, turning into the closet and closing the door. 

“I’m serious about you meeting the boys, Sarah.” Kiara says after a minute. She doesn’t know why she only can build up the courage to talk to Sarah about the Pogues through the closed door of Sarah’s closet.

“Of course I want to meet the boys I am competing with for the title of Best Friend.” Sarah yells through the door. If Sarah could see her, Kiara would have flipped her off. Kiara has long since explained her ability to have multiple best friends to Sarah, ever since Sarah had started referring to Kiara as her best friend. Whereas Sarah considered herself a One Best Friend type of person, Kiara held enough space in her heart for both the boys and Sarah to take up prime real estate. Sarah found it endearing, if not a little confusing. 

“But I can’t go to the Cut.” Sarah adds after a second, opening the door to the closet. She opens it just in time to see Kiara’s shoulders fall. “My dad would skin me alive for leaving Figure Eight without telling him, and he absolutely won’t allow me to go.”

Kiara nods at that, and she realizes she never actually thought through what it would mean to facilitate a meeting between Sarah and the Pogues. Of course Sarah can’t go to the Cut - her dad would never let her. Kiara’s not dumb enough to suggest inviting to the boys to Tanny Hill - Ward might just blow a gasket, and she knows that no matter what she does, Rafe and JJ are going to get in a fight. 

She’s not exactly fond of Rafe, per se, but he’s slowly growing on her as she spends more time at the Cameron household. She doesn’t think she’ll ever like Rafe, but without the snide comments, he’s manageable. She doesn’t want to risk him and JJ getting into a fight because she wants to have a pep rally with all her best friends. She’s certain that would not make her favorable in the Cameron’s eyes. The aftermath of a disaster like that would be less than optimal. 

Kiara can’t even entertain the thought of having them over her house. Her parents adore Sarah, and they love having her over, but adding the Pogues to the mix would be a nightmare. She already can see how it would play out, how her mom would hover around and her dad would give them no privacy. Her house is absolutely not an option. 

Without the Boneyard or the Chateau as an option, Kiara realizes she has no plan. The boys can’t get into a Kook party to save their lives, and she can’t exactly have the boys meet up for dinner with her and Sarah. She contemplates the Wreck for a second, but even that feels like it would be under her parents insane supervision. She doesn’t see any viable option.

“At some point, I’ll introduce you guys. I just have to figure out how.” Kiara says, deciding to drop the topic for now. “And can I just say, you look so great. Dennis is going to lose his mind.” 

“Oh my god, I hope so. I really want this to go well, Kiara!” Sarah says, and Kiara immediately starts recommending jackets for her to wear. She’ll introduce the boys and Sarah at some point, but for now, she puts the thought out of her mind. 

  
  


\----------

  
  
  


The first time Kiara shows up to the Chateau in one of her newly acquired crop tops, Pope nearly chokes on the soda he’s drinking. 

It’s not like the crop top is scandalous - the boys have gone entire summers seeing Kiara in nothing but bikinis. The small expanse of skin she bares around her midriff isn’t something the boys are exactly unfamiliar with, and the outfit is far more conservative than any of her bathing suits. It’s not the fact that she’s showing a little bit of skin - it’s more than that. 

The boys would normally give two shits if Kiara wears a bikini or a potato bag. They aren’t exactly connoisseurs of fashion themselves, with their baggy shorts and t-shirts with the arms cut off. It’s the way she’s carrying herself, the way the crop top hits her figure that reminds the boys that she’s a _girl_. More than that, she’s a Kook girl, with fancy floral prints and small gold necklaces. The crop top is not scandalous, no. The crop top is different, so unlike Kiara’s normal attire, that the boys are reminded that Kiara belongs in a different class and a different society than them. 

Pope reverts to being unable to form coherent sentences. 

When he first met Kiara in math class, it felt like he was drowning in his own thoughts whenever Kiara so much as looked at him. Kiara had been gracious, ignoring his inability to form rational thought and smiling as he stumbled through sentences. He had grown out of it as he got to know Kiara. The more time he spent around Kiara when she was goofing off, or yelling at the boys, or slinging trays full of french fries to them at the Wreck, the more he could talk to her. Eventually, his awkward tendencies around Kiara just fell to the wayside. He hadn’t had trouble talking to her in years, because Kiara wasn’t someone Pope ever felt awkward around. 

Until now. Pope’s kicking himself, because this is _Kiara._ He’s seen her snort soda out of her nose from laughing too hard, he’s seen her try to break dance in the Chateau’s living room, he’s seen her jump off the dock fully clothed and come up looking like a drowned rat. He knows Kiara - Jesus, it feels like he’s been friends with her forever. He knows everything about Kiara, except, apparently, that she looks really hot in Sarah Cameron’s crop tops. 

He expects the boys to tease him mercilessly about the stuttering and the awkward pauses he begins to exhibit in Kiara’s presence, but they don’t mention it. Even JJ, who will jump at any opportunity to give Pope shit, keeps his mouth shut about the new, adverse reaction Pope has to Kiara’s fashion choices. Whatever _that_ implies is enough to scare the living daylights out of Pope. 

It starts with the crop tops, but it doesn’t end there. It’s not a quick transition, either. Some days, Kiara shows up to the Chateau, looking exactly the same as she had every day since fifth grade - baggy shirts and linen pants and cut off jean shorts. She’ll wear her hair tied up in a messy bun, curls tumbling out of her updo and fly away hairs framing her face. She'll tie her hair back with a bandana, and smile like nothing has changed in the last five years. 

Even on days when she shows up looking like the old Kiara, she replaces her old puka shell and crystal necklaces with the new _‘K’_ necklace she acquired for her birthday. 

Some days, she shows up to the Chateau looking like someone Pope isn’t sure he’s ever met. She still wears the necklace from Sarah, and she wears denim skirts, crop tops, or short, flowy dresses that are no good for adventuring. Sometimes she wears makeup, sometimes she won’t. Her shoes become more and more impractical, until JJ has to yell at her for wearing a pair of open-toed sandals to work on a motor. She rolls her eyes when he tells her she’s going to lose a toe. 

The worst offender, in JJ’s opinion, is Kiara’s new straightener. It slowly becomes more common to see Kiara with straightened hair then her natural curls. Let’s be honest, JJ doesn’t _actually_ care. He’s been friends with Kiara far too long to try and tell her - or any other women, for that matter - what they should do with their body. He’s never been one to give a shit if a girl wears a full face of makeup or none at all, or if she does her hair in a certain way, or if she wears anything that makes her comfortable. Objectively, Kiara straightening her hair should affect JJ in the same way - it should be relatively meaningless, a purely cosmetic change that means less than nothing. In fact, Kiara looks almost as good with straightened hair as she does with her natural curls, if JJ’s being honest (not that he checks Kiara out often). 

It’s the principle of the matter that bugs JJ. JJ has spent _years_ listening to Kiara rant about the discrimination against natural hair and the social implications of forced assimilation based on white beauty standards. He could recite Kiara’s arguments by memory, he's heard it so many times. He used to roll his eyes when she got so worked up over something that seemed pretty inconsequential. He never argued with her, because she was usually right, but he always imagined that Kiara being angry about the way girls did their hair was a little bit backwards. 

He gets it now. Kiara straightening her hair everyday has his blood boiling - it’s like a visual reminder that her anger at the inequities in the world is waning. He knows it must be exhausting to care as much about everything as Kiara does, to get angry at every injustice when there are _so many_ injustices _,_ but he never expected Kiara to back down. He never expected her to stop standing up for things she cared about. Straightening her hair is trivial, but it’s a reminder that the Kiara he loved and grew up with was slowly disappearing. 

It doesn’t feel like the boys are losing Kiara - it feels like Kiara is losing herself. She doesn’t rant as much, her political debates are less feisty. She hardly ever mentions the things that used to piss her off - single use plastic, excessive consumerism, unfair labor practices. JJ doesn’t think he’s heard her say the words _‘human rights violations’_ in a month. 

JJ pushes the envelope one day, hoping to get a rise out of her and recognize his best friend for maybe the first time in weeks. He says something crass, a comment about a girl on a dock that would normally have Kiara throwing him off the boat. He learned long ago not to disrespect women in front of Kiara, even and especially not for a joke. He’s been doing his duty of drinking Respecting Women Juice first out of fear of Kiara, and then because he genuinely does respect women. He hasn’t ever made such a crass comment in front of Kiara, and he _knows_ it’ll be enough to get her angry about something again. He’ll take her getting angry at something, even if it’s him. 

All the boys hold their breath after JJ makes his comment. Pope’s giving him a look that screams _do you have a death wish?!_ John B’s eyes don’t leave Kiara as he waits for her to pounce and verbally berate JJ until he apologizes. It’s a moment of extreme tension on the tiny boat.

Then, Kiara laughs. Rolls her eyes and sits back in her chair. She moves onto the next topic of conversation as she flips her straightened hair over her shoulder. 

The boys are floored. That has _never_ happened before. It feels like the girl sitting across from JJ is a stranger.

JJ wants to push her out of the Pogue and into the water. Maybe she’d emerge from the water as his best friend again. 

  
  
  


\----------

  
  
  


“Guess what your best friend signed you up for?” 

Kiara looks up from her salad to see Sarah sliding ungracefully into the seat next to her. Behind Sarah, Olivia is eyeing the two of them suspiciously, as if she can’t believe Sarah is referring to Kiara as her best friend. Kiara smirks at Olivia’s bewilderment. 

When she turns her attention back to Sarah, Sarah’s smile could outshine the sun. Kiara knows that look - it’s a dangerous look. 

“Oh god.” Kiara says in response, trying to gauge Sarah’s level of excitement - the more excited Sarah is, the more terrified Kiara should be. Whatever’s hiding behind Sarah’s smile could be the best or worst thing to happen to Kiara in years. 

“I signed you - and me - up for Winter Cotillion Committee.” Sarah says, as if she’s announcing that the two of them are having tea with the Queen of England. She punctuates the statement with jazz hands, for effect. 

“Jesus Christ, Sarah, that’s the most pretentious statement I’ve ever heard you make.” Kiara says, turning back to her salad. This bit of news firmly belongs in the _‘worst thing’_ pile. Kiara’s not even 100% sure she knows what a Cotillion is, but she knows she hates it. 

“Bullshit. Winter Cotillion is not _pretentious._ It’s traditional!” Kiara hits Sarah with a look. “Okay, so it is a little pretentious. But I’m really excited, Kie! This is the first school dance we can go to!” 

“Sarah, you went to Homecoming.” Kiara reminds her as she stabs a cucumber in her salad. 

“Yeah, but you didn’t! That’s the important part! This is our first dance _together!_ And we can be on the committee!” When Kiara doesn’t seem convinced, Sarah tries another tactic. “If we are in charge of the dance, it’s going to be so much fun! If we let everyone else run it, we are going to go and we are going to hate it.”

“We could just not go. It’s worked for me so far.”

_“Kiara.”_ Sarah says in her very best pleading voice, and Kiara can’t handle it. 

“Alright, I guess you have a point.” Kiara says begrudgingly. Sarah’s so excited for the dance, Kiara would be a bad friend to rain on her parade by dropping out of the committee. Sure, Kiara might hate it and the dance will probably suck either way, but Sarah’s her best friend. Kiara will suck it up and deal with the pretentious bullshit if it’ll make Sarah smile. 

“Do I have to get a dress?” Kiara asks, like she doesn’t already know the answer. 

“Kiara Carrera, of course you are getting a dress.” Sarah says, slamming her hands down on the table in front of her. Kiara, along with most of the rest of the table, jump in surprise at her sudden movement. “We are going to _own_ the Cotillion Court.”

  
  
  


\----------

  
  


Kiara continues to try and keep a balance between the boys and Sarah. She starts to gain more of Sarah’s friends as her own - Scarlett wants to take Kiara shopping, Amy wants to have a sleepover, Olivia wants to go to every football game. Sarah’s social calendar - and by extension, Kiara’s social calendar - is fully booked, and it impedes on her ability to meet with the boys. 

For the most part, the boys don’t complain. It’s not exactly ideal to be playing second fiddle to a group of Kook princesses, but it’s not like the prospect of second fiddle is completely foreign to them. They’ve been playing second fiddle to the Kook kids since they were born - it’s just another fact of nature that they have to accept to survive. 

Kiara’s personality shift is another one of the things the boys just accept to survive. It’s not like they are really that surprised - they knew Kiara was going to a new school, and they knew she would be around less often. Perhaps none of them anticipated her going full Kook, befriending the Kook Princess, but it’s not like they weren’t expecting some changes. It’s not the end of the world - even if they only get Kiara once a week, it’s fine. It sucks, but it’s fine. 

It stops being as fine when Kiara and Sarah join the Winter Cotillion Committee. The dance is actually in February, but the committee meetings really begin ramping up in the late fall to get everything prepared for the dance. Per Kiara’s complaint about a lame dance, Sarah volunteers the two of them for just about everything - Sarah figures that the more they are involved with, the more fun the dance will be, and she desperately wants Kiara to have fun at the dance. 

Suddenly, Kiara’s at early morning committee meetings on flower arrangements, or after school treks to the caterer for taste testing, or on weekend shopping sprees for the perfect outfit. The Cotillion Committee devours the girls time, drowning them in responsibilities and planning meetings. 

Kiara doesn’t tell the boys about the Cotillion - she’d rather die than see the look on their faces when they find out she’s a finalist for the Cotillion Court. She offers weak explanations for her sudden lack of availability, blaming environmental club or debate team or occasionally the Wreck. She doesn’t like lying to the boys, but in this new balancing act she’s created for herself, it’s necessary.

It’s no longer a question of when Kiara’s going to show up - it’s if. She starts bailing on the boys with no warning, going radio silent in the group chat and missing their calls for days. She’ll show up a few days later, bringing as much food as her hands could carry, looking exhausted beyond belief. She’ll explain her disappearance away as emergency meetings or disastrous group projects, even though the boys don’t ask. They’ll take the food and they won’t complain, but they all start to worry. 

Kiara is absent from the Chateau for a full week before John B mentions that something might be wrong. It’s not like he’s oblivious - despite his himbo energy, John B can sometimes be perceptive. Besides, he’d have to be blind to not realize that she’s spending more and more time with Sarah. He also knows that a new school and new friends can be hard to balance sometimes, and he always knew going to the Academy meant she wasn’t going to have as much free time. 

He doesn’t know when _‘not as much free time’_ translated to _‘no time at all.’_

“Kie hasn’t been around all week.” John B says to Pope and JJ, as if the two of them aren’t keenly aware of that fact. The three of them are seated around a fire in the backyard, roasting some stale marshmallows and trying to ignore the fact that the food Kiara’s been consistently supplying since fifth grade has completely run out. JJ didn’t even remember what it was like to walk into the Chateau and be unable to find food - in the last few weeks, he’s been reminded several times. 

“Yeah, she’s been pretty absent lately.” Pope agrees, staring intently at his marshmallow. 

“School must be picking up.” JJ says, because the best thing he knows how to do is how to deflect. 

“Yeah, or something like that.” Pope says sarcastically, and JJ makes no move to comment on his tone. He’s not even sure what’d he would say - he’s not sure how to defend Kiara when it’s so blatantly obvious what’s going on. 

“The last time we went this long without seeing her was when she went to Disney in seventh grade.” John B says, and JJ shakes his head. 

“Not true. She disappeared this summer for over a week after the fight with Rafe.” He says, because he remembers that week and a half unfortunately well. 

“That wasn’t her choice.” Pope counters, and JJ turns to look at him. 

“What are you saying?” He challenges, and Pope looks him in the eye, stepping up to the challenge. 

“I’m saying that Kiara’s hanging out with a bunch of Kooks instead of us.” Pope says, and it’s silent for a second. No one had admitted something like that out loud before, and hearing it out loud is like a knife in the chest to all the boys. Even Pope is surprised by how much his own words affect him. 

“What do you expect her to do?” JJ says after he recovers from the shock. “She couldn’t suffer through high school without friends.”

“She _had_ friends.” Pope reminds JJ, and JJ swats a hand at him. 

“We aren’t her friends, Pope. We’re her family. She has to keep up appearances with the Kooks to survive, but she’ll come back to us.”

“Yeah, okay, JJ.” Pope says, and JJ knows Pope doesn’t believe a word he just said. It turns JJ’s stomach that Pope is so easily swayed away from their years of friendship - he’s so ready to believe Kiara’s abandoning them. JJ’s ready to give him a piece of his mind when John B interrupts. 

“JJ’s right.” John B says, stopping whatever fight might have broken out. “She’s allowed to have other friends.”

“She’s not allowed to forget us.” Pope says harshly. 

“Oh, please. She can’t forget us.” JJ says, leaning back in his seat and hoping he looks more confident in that statement than he feels. 

  
  
  


\----------

  
  


JJ’s confidence in Kiara’s loyalty starts to crack, and then completely shatter, when she stops showing up at all. She doesn’t respond in the group chat or to the multiple messages all the boys send. She goes radio silence in the course of a few weeks. 

From Kiara’s perspective, it’s not a conscious decision. It’s not like she was trying to avoid the boys or their messages. It’s just different being friends with the Kook princesses. Kiara’s used to the easy going nature of the boys, not the emotional turmoil the girls always seem to be encountering - _Katie_ kissed _Connor_ but _Amy_ likes _Connor_ and now none of them are talking to each other. She’s not use to Cotillion Committees and football games every Friday. One day, she was an outcast at the Academy. The next day, she’s the lady in waiting to the Kook Princess. It’s dizzying, the stratospheric leap she’s made in a matter of weeks, if not days. It leaves her head spinning. Her emotional well seems to be drained everyday, and she collapses into bed too exhausted to think about anything other than eight hours without drama or responsibilities. 

Kiara’s busy, but she’s happy. She’s the type of happy that has her mimicking Sarah’s sunshine smile, the type of happy that makes her want to forget the sad times. It’s not like she doesn’t want to talk to the boys, but the longer she goes without talking to the boys, the more her anxiety over her return increases. It reminds her that while she partying with the Kook Girls, or trying on new dresses for Cotillion, she’s actively choosing the Kooks over her Pogues. It's easier for her to just ... ignore the problem than face it head on.

Kiara talks a big game about the emotional legwork she has to do with the boys. She’s always the one telling them to work through their emotions, to not bottle things up, to not ignore the difficult or sad things they all have to face. And she’s a goddamn hypocrite for it. 

Kiara's also slowly realizing she only really feels comfortable talking to Sarah - Sarah’s the only person who _really_ understands her. Sarah understands her disapproval of the Kooks, but also her desire to fit in. When she’s with her more casual Kook friends, Kiara has to watch her words. She doesn’t talk about politics or activism or the environment around the Kooks - the only reprieve she gets is when Sarah gives her a look like _can you believe this?_

She's also finding that, more and more, she can’t relax around the boys. She loves her boys dearly, and she knows they love her, but there are some things that scare her. She’s scared of saying the wrong thing around them, scared that they’ll write her problems off as _rich people problems_ now that she’s friends with the Kooks. She’s scared they’ll roll their eyes at the Cotillion, or scoff at the Academy gossip if she mentions it, because the Katie-Amy-Connor love triangle pales in comparison to the actual tragedies that occur on the Cut. She’s worried that someday, they’ll realize that Kiara doesn’t really feel like a Pogue anymore, and she doesn’t know what she’ll do then. 

It seems like the only time she’s truly herself these days is when she’s alone with Sarah. Sarah becomes her go-to girl, her best friend, her closet confidante. Sarah understands her worries, listens to her rants, laughs at her jokes. Kiara’s whole life begins to revolve around Sarah, and sometimes, it feels like Sarah is orbiting Kiara in the same way. Kiara’s calendar, her free time, and her camera roll are all occupied by Sarah Cameron. And Kiara doesn’t mind it. In fact, she likes it. 

One day, she looks down at her phone and realizes she hasn’t seen the Pogues in three weeks.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annnnd on that despressing note, the next chapter will be called "Kiara Carrera Makes A Plan (And It Goes Horribly Wrong)"


	10. Kiara Carrera Makes A Plan (And It Goes Horribly Wrong)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello!! 
> 
> So, the reason this chapter took so long to get out is because I started my new job last week! It’s been a little stressful working remotely and getting acquainted to zoom meetings and such, so I didn’t have as much time to write. In the future, I think my weeks will be less stressful, so hopefully I will have more time to write. 
> 
> That being said, given my new schedule with my job, I think I’ll have some sort of posting schedule. Most likely, I’m going to try to post a chapter every week on either Monday or Tuesday. We’ll see how long I stick to that schedule (originally I intended to post this yesterday but it was not ready, so the schedule is already going real well). 
> 
> Also, I’m vaguely contemplating making a tumblr. Let me know what you guys think!

It seems like time is moving both at a snail's pace and at the speed of light. Classes and schoolwork drag on - every day, Kiara wonders if her hour long Spanish lecture is going to end. School claws its way by, and everyday Kiara goes home feeling as if she spent the last five years within the walls of the Academy. 

Sarah is the only thing that makes her days bearable. Moments with Sarah also seem to drag on - afternoons spent in her room, lunch periods where they share gossip and apple slices, weekends shopping and watching movies. Unlike school, Kiara wishes her time with Sarah would never end - when afternoons seem to drag on and weekends feel like months, she’s thankful. Instead of feeling bored, Kiara feels calm. Urgency and anxiety seem to slip away - Kiara and Sarah can spend an hour together and it feels like they’ve been side-by-side for years. Kiara revels in it, in the simple way Sarah makes every interaction feel important. 

For once in Kiara’s life, she’s getting along better with her mom than her dad. Anna and Kiara start spending time together - looking at clothes, getting their nails done, having brunch with Sarah and her soon-to-be step-mom. It’s not that Kiara and her mom didn’t get along before, but Kiara always felt like her mom wanted something from her that she wasn’t willing to offer. Now that Sarah and Kiara are friends, the mother-daughter relationship feels easy. With her parents off her back and her classmates accepting her, all of Kiara’s life feels easy. She’s making friends, fitting in, and her grades are sky-rocketing. Kiara didn’t know how much she wanted _easy_ until she got it. 

In September, this is all Kiara could have asked for and more - except for one, teen-tiny glitch. 

She hasn’t talked to the boys in three weeks. It doesn’t make sense how three weeks seems to fly by in the blink of an eye when days and afternoons drag on in school and in Sarah’s presence. It shouldn’t be possible for nearly a month to pass by without Kiara noticing - but unfortunately, that’s what happens. 

It feels like both the blink of an eye and eternity - she doesn’t feel like she’s been avoiding them at all, but she also doesn’t know how to reach out to them after so long. Her phone is filled with unopened messages from all of them. 

Her first thought is to text one of them - not in the group chat, because that would be a disaster. No one has used the Pogue Lyfe group chat in weeks, and Kiara can’t be the first one to send a message.

Kiara also can’t text Pope. He texted her _‘hey’_ three weeks ago and nothing else since. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out how Pope feels. Any conversation she tries with him will be a non-starter.

Even though Pope had given up early on, John B and JJ had kept up a charade of texting her everyday for a few weeks - kind of like how they texted her when she was grounded. John B stopped texting her late last week. A few days ago, JJ had followed suit. 

The guilt eats Kiara alive if she thinks about it too much - the boys who have had her back since 5th grade get tossed to the side for a shiny new friend. Kiara knows that’s not what happened, and that’s not what she intended, but honestly … from the outside, it looks like exactly what happened. The boys will see it that way - anyone would see it that way if they didn’t know how Kiara felt. She knows how it looks, she understands what the boys must be thinking. 

Kiara feels like she’s missing a limb. She hasn’t gone this long without talking to the boys in five years. Kiara desperately wants to break out of this pattern - she’s dangerously close to losing her boys forever and she can feel it. She decides that whatever her apology is going to be, it’s going to have to be in person. 

She contemplates just showing up at the Chateau - she'll bring some food, a decently worded apology, and maybe a couple tears. There’s a fifty-fifty chance it might work - the boys might hear her out, and she might be able to convince them to forgive her. There’s also a fifty-fifty chance it’ll back fire on her before she even apologizes. Cornering the boys on their own property, when they aren’t expecting it? It could make any of them angry. She doesn’t know what level of anger each of them have reached - if JJ’s angry enough, he’ll scare her into leaving before she can even get to the apology. 

Kiara’s not ready for that - a cornered JJ is a scary JJ, and even though she knows he has the ability to control himself, she doesn’t want to put any of them in that situation. The Chateau is a no-go. 

She could show up at Rixton’s Cove, or the beach, but she doesn’t know when they’ll be there. It’s not like they have any sort of regular schedule - everything is up in the air with the Pogues. 

It takes Kiara one sleepless Wednesday night of brainstorming to come up with a plan - she’s scrolling through Instagram when she sees a picture of the boys at the Boneyard. While Kiara had been busy playing Kook Princess, the boys have become a staple of the Boneyard. She’s seen them there every weekend, in some Instagram pictures, some questionable Snapchat stories, and one remarkable Facebook post. Even Pope has allowed himself to be dragged to the Boneyard, though she only sees him in the background of pictures, dodging cameras and any incriminating photographic evidence. 

The more she thinks about it, the more obvious it becomes - the answer to her dilemma is the Boneyard. The Boneyard is mostly neutral territory, though it’s decidedly empty of Kooks. The keggers are notorious for their open invitations on the Cut, though the same invitation does not extend to Kooks. Thankfully, Kiara still considers herself part Pogue. 

She’ll be free to wear her least Kook-y outfit to the party without fear of running into an Academy classmate. It’s almost freeing to not have to put on her best clothes - slipping into her old t-shirts and jeans feels like a blessing after weeks of floral prints and flowy dresses. She even goes as far as contemplating taking off the necklace Sarah gave her, but she ultimately decides against it. Kiara will wear her hair in curls, she’ll don her old clothes, but she won’t lose the necklace. The necklace means alot to her, and it represents the place Sarah carved for her among the Kooks. Whatever the Pogues think of her, Kiara is part Kook, whether she wants to admit it or not. If the boys can’t accept this weird dichotomy in her life, that’s on them. She’ll reach out with a million olive branches if she needs to, but she will not hide herself from the boys. 

Kiara makes up her mind. She’s not necessarily up to date with the Cut gossip, and she hasn’t received an invitation to the Boneyard in months, but she would bet her bottom dollar that someone’s throwing a kegger at the beach on Friday night. She’ll show up, apologize to the boys, and work on getting her life back together.

The boys won’t feel cornered, and she’s hoping they won’t be angry enough to ignore her in person. John B and JJ will be loosened up by alcohol, which will make the apology easier. Pope will be stressed, no doubt, but, honestly, when is he not stressed? There won’t be a better time to approach him with an apology - he’ll be the most difficult to deal with, but Kiara has faith in her ability to read the boys. The party will cover up any awkwardness that could ensue from a three-week late apology. 

Kiara has every intention of going through with her plan. 

She makes an honest effort of it, too. She clears her calendar for the weekend- she was going to go with Sarah and Olivia to a football game Friday night, and then dress shopping with Scarlett on Saturday morning. She makes up an excuse about a non-existent shift at the Wreck and wiggles her way out of both engagements. Her friends don’t complain, and the first step in her plan goes smoothly. 

Once Kiara finalizes her plans to go to the Boneyard, she's filled with nervous excitement. She feels guilty about what she did to the boys, and she’s terrified about their reactions, but more than that, she’s just excited and relieved to be seeing them again.

It's not like Kiara's as lonely as she once was. Sarah is great, and very clearly the best girl friend Kiara's ever had. Even Sarah's friends are becoming more and more managable as the days go by, and Kiara finds herself making friends outside of Sarah. 

Even her relationship with Sarah pales in comparison to the boys - the boys are her people, the friends she’s had forever, the people she will call first when she needs help. Three weeks without them has made Kiara’s life feel less vibrant, and she’s desperate to get them back. This trip to the Boneyard isn’t a check box on her to do list, or an errand she has to run for her guilty conscience. Kiara’s heading to the Boneyard because she’s honestly sorry, and she can’t stand another day without her boys. 

She misses John B’s optimism and his goofy nature - Sarah Cameron is good for sunshine, but she can’t replace John B’s exuberance. She misses Pope and his awkward tendences, his ill-timed science facts and his inability to talk to girls that aren’t Kiara. The fact that Pope has trouble talking to any girl that isn't Kiara has always filled her with a sense of pride - the fact that Pope trusts her enough to not be nervous around her makes her smile. She misses JJ’s shenanigans and his complete lack of respect for authority, his terrible jokes and the way he tries to play off the fact that he’s actually a giant softie. She misses being around the boys, and the casual intimacy she grew up surrounded by - she misses hugs and cuddling on the couch and holding hands as they jump off the dock. She hugs Sarah often, and she'll even occasionally hug one of the other Kook girls, but it's not the same. There’s a physical barrier between most people that the Pogues just don’t have. 

Kiara misses bringing food to the Pogues and having them clamber over themselves to get some fries. She misses the long days she spent on the HMS Pogue, and the longer nights she spent by the fire. She misses Rixton’s Cove, and the Boneyard, and hell, she misses Big John. In the last year, Big John had been more and more absent, and Kiara had seen less of him as his research excursions became more and more common. That doesn’t change the fact that Big John has been like an uncle to her since her and JJ started the Pogues, and he’s taken care of her and the boys as best he could. She misses his gruff nature, his quiet kindness, and his no-bullshit attitude. She’ll be glad to get back to some sort of normality after tonight. If tonight goes well enough, maybe tomorrow she’ll be waking up on the pull-out couch in the Chateau to the sound of Big John making pancakes. She’s excited for that possibility. 

She’s not excited for the anger, or the potentially difficult conversation that she may have with them. She reminds herself that she can’t shy away from difficult conversations, and the boys have a right to be angry. More than that, she knows her boys - they’ll be angry with her, but given a couple beers, enough food, and a little groveling, they’ll probably forgive her. Kiara is hoping that things go back to normal soon, and by the time she steps onto the HMS Pogue after school next Monday, it’ll be ancient history. The three week hiatus will become something they joke about without any sense of anger. She’ll learn to find a balance between the Kook Princess and the Pogue Boys, and it’ll all be behind them. 

On Friday, Kiara spends her entire English class dreaming up a fool-proof apology plan. She knows she’ll start with an actual apology, follow it up with a little bribery, and then beg if necessary. 

Typically, she’d bribe the boys with some food, but given the circumstance, she’s not sure it’ll be enough to convince them to forgive her. Kiara’s sitting in her class, listening to the teacher drone on and on about Macbeth, when it hits her - she needs to bribe the boys with _beer._ It’s so obvious, it’s laughable - the more beer the boys drink, the more accepting of her apology they’ll be. By supplying them with a couple of beers, she’ll be garnering brownie points and softening them to her apology at the same time. It’s perfect!

There’s a refrigerator in the garage where her dad keeps his extensive collection of craft beers. They’re mostly pretentious shit - fancy beers from Kildare Island Brewery Company or some mainland microbreweries. Kiara’s pretty sure the boys will never appreciate the difference between any one of her dad’s beers and Natty Light, but it’s the only thing she can get her hands on. 

When she gets home from school, she sneaks six beers out of the fridge and up to her room. She hides them under her bed while she showers, preparing herself for a night at the Boneyard. 

As far as peace offerings go, she’s pretty sure she nailed this one. 

  
  
  


She’s out of the shower and about to start diffusing her hair when her phone buzzes. 

  
  


**_Scarlett Anderson_ **

_You’re never going to believe_

_what Sarah just told me._

Kiara is considering whether she wants to reply to Scarlett or not when her phone lights up with Sarah’s ringtone. Kiara doesn’t think twice when she answers it. 

“Hey Sarah, what’s up?” Kiara says conversationally, balancing her phone between her ear and her shoulder while she untangles the cord for her hair dryer. 

“Oh my god, thank god!” Sarah yells through the phone, her voice slightly panicked. “I thought I was going to have to go to the Wreck and drag you out of your shift. I was fully planning on fighting your dad for your freedom.” 

Kiara cringes with the reminder that she lied to Sarah about her whereabouts this evening - she hadn’t intended for Sarah to be seeking her out. Thank god Sarah didn’t go to the Wreck and ask for Kiara. That would have been a disaster. 

“Oh, yeah.” Kiara mutters, looking for a believable lie to explain her ability to pick up her phone while waiting tables. She eventually decides on a half truth. “No fighting necessary - I got the shift off because business was slow.” 

Kiara’s pretty certain that the Wreck is packed to the brim, given it’s a Friday night, and she’s hoping Sarah doesn’t snoop around and discover Kiara’s lie. Kiara’s a pretty bad liar. 

“God is real and his name is Michael Carrera.” Sarah says, and Kiara rolls her eyes despite herself. Her best friend is so dramatic. “I’m serious, Kie - you have no idea. This is phenomenal timing.”

“Uh, how so?” Kiara says, terrified to hear the answer. She’s not sure what Sarah’s getting at, but she’s got a feeling it might ruin her plans to go to the Boneyard. Kiara doesn’t know how long she can lie to Sarah before Sarah gets suspicious. She’s never lied to Sarah before. 

“Dennis called me.” Sarah says instead of explaining herself, and Kiara sucks in a breath. That douchebag. 

“Did you tell him to go fuck himself?” Kiara asks, her voice light. 

A few weeks ago, Dennis had taken Sarah on a date. Kiara and Sarah had spent hours picking out an outfit and doing her makeup, and Kiara had waited at Tanny Hill for Sarah to get home. Once Sarah got in the front door, they spent the entire night dissecting every minute of the date, going over every detail, talking about Dennis and his charm and how good he looked in his blue button down shirt. 

Dennis didn’t call her back the next day, or the day after that. When Sarah saw him in school the next Monday, he had ignored her. He hadn’t reached out to Sarah for weeks, and Sarah had cried on Kiara’s shoulders countless times since that date. Kiara had taken to secretly flipping him off every time she saw him. The fact that he’s calling Sarah back now, after all these weeks, makes Kiara’s blood boil. 

“Kie!” Sarah chastises. “No, I did not. He apologized.”

“And then you told him to go fuck himself?”

“Kiara!” Sarah says, her voice exasperated. “I did not tell him to go fuck himself at any point!”

“Okay, so what did you tell him?” Kiara says, propping her elbows on her vanity and leaning forward. “Cause it’s starting to sound to me like you forgave him and I know for a _fact_ that you didn’t do that.” 

Sarah’s silent for a minute, and Kiara’s about to yell at her when she speaks again. 

“I haven’t forgiven him.”

Kiara groans loudly, running her hand down her face. “Why do I feel likes there’s a silent _‘yet’_ at the end of that sentence?” 

“... because he invited us to Topper’s house for a party tonight.” Sarah says quickly, like it’s all one word. 

“And you said no, right?” Kiara prompts, but Sarah remains silent. “Because I have a shift at the Wreck and you have some shred of dignity, right?”

“No!” Sarah suddenly yells. “You see, you don’t have a shift at the Wreck! And I may or may not have dignity.” 

_“Sarah!”_

“Look, I told him I would go and hear him out.” Sarah finally admits, and Kiara would strangle her if they weren’t speaking over the phone. “He’s a really nice guy, and I really like him, Kie!” 

“He ghosted you!” Kiara reminds her. “For weeks!” 

“He said he can explain it to me! Kie - I need to hear him out! For my own sanity.”

“Bullshit.”

“I’m going with or without you.” 

Sarah knows precisely what she’s doing - she’s spent the last couple of weeks figuring Kiara out. By threatening to go to an upperclassman party alone, she’s forcing Kiara’s hand. Sarah knows Kiara will never be okay with Sarah walking into one of those parties alone - Kiara only trusts the Kook boys as far as she can throw them, and Kiara doesn’t have great upper body strength. Kiara won’t let Sarah go to a party alone to flounder in front of her crush. The Kook boys will take advantage of young, unsuspecting girls whenever they are given the opportunity. There’s been a rash of roofie-like incidents among the upperclassman girls, and Kiara’s heart clenches with terror when she pictures that happening to Sarah. Sarah’s ultimatum makes the decision clear - Kiara’s either reconciling with the boys, or putting Sarah’s safety first. 

It’s not a hard decision - Kiara believes Sarah when she says she’s going with or without her, and Kiara doesn’t have much of a choice beyond that. Even if Rafe ends up at the same party, or if Scarlett and Olivia go, she doesn’t trust any of them to truly protect Sarah. She can’t have Sarah’s wellbeing on her conscience, even if it means one more sleepless night without an apology to the Pogues. She’s gone three weeks without apologizing, she can save Sarah tonight and apologize to them tomorrow. She’ll need to rethink her apology plan, but she’s sure she can make it work.

“This is extortion.” Kiara says as she makes up her mind. “But I guess if you insist on being a dumbass, it’s my responsibility to try and keep you safe.” 

“Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you! I promise you won’t regret it!”

As Kiara reaches into her vanity to pull out her straightener, she already regrets it. 

  
  
  


Kook parties all feel the same.

It’s not like Cut parties have a wide variety, but at least there’s some deviation from the norm. There’s Boneyard parties, with tourons and bonfires and dancing in the sand. Sometimes there are house parties, with drinking games and music so loud you can’t hear yourself thinking. Occasionally, people will throw parties at Pelican’s Marina, when the overnight staff turns a blind eye and they can do cannon balls off the dock. Usually, they’ll ditch the speakers at the marina, and one of the band kids who can hold a tune will bring a guitar. They'll sit around as someone strums a few familiar chords so they can all sing along to old songs. Kiara hasn’t been to many parties, but she knows they all exist. 

Kook parties feel like a scripted reality television show. It’s no different at Topper’s house - Kiara and Sarah arrive, and everyone cheers and hugs them. Kiara and Sarah make the rounds, taking a bunch of pictures with girls who wear the same outfits in different styles. By the time Kiara finds Scarlett in the crowd, she already knows how the night is going to end - they’ll dance, at some point they’ll watch a drinking game they aren’t invited to play, and then they’ll either get sick of it all or the cops will show up. Kiara’s already over it. 

The monotony of the Kook parties has never really bothered Kiara since she became friends with Sarah, but tonight it feels like Kiara’s hyper aware of everything. She’s constantly comparing everything going on around her - Figure Eight vs. the Cut, the Boneyard vs. Topper’s house, Sarah vs. the Pogues.

It’s not a fair comparison - they are entirely different entities, Kiara reminds herself. Kiara's knows that she's doing all of them a disservice by comparing them to each other. That doesn't change the Kiara can’t forget that she’s supposed to be apologizing to the boys as she stands next to Scarlett in Topper's living room. 

“You okay?” Scarlett asks as she nurses a red solo cup. Outside of Sarah, Scarlett is Kiara’s closest friend at the Academy. Unlike Olivia, Scarlett warmed up to Kiara almost as quickly as Sarah did. It took a couple of weeks, but now Kiara feels comfortable enough being around Scarlett without Sarah as a barrier.

“Um, yeah.” Kiara says, thankful that Scarlett can’t read her mind. “Just ... tired.”

“Can you believe this shit?” Scarlett says, pointing her cup at Sarah, who’s dancing with a couple girls in the living room. Dennis is in the kitchen, clearly able to see Sarah as she clambers onto the coffee table, but he’s made no move to talk to her. Kiara almost feels bad for Sarah.

“No.” Kiara says honestly. “If a guy ghosted me for three weeks, I would not be crawling to a party to talk to him.” 

“And you had work! I told Sarah this was a bad idea. She’s not even talking to him.” Scarlett said, turning around so she can’t see Sarah dancing on the coffee table. Even though Scarlett’s been friends with Sarah longer than Kiara, Scarlett is almost always fed up with Sarah’s antics. Although Scarlett and Sarah claim to be best friends, Kiara’s growing very used to seeing Scarlett completely irritated by Sarah. 

“Eh, I got off work for a slow shift.” Kiara says, the lie falling easily from her lips. Scarlett looks at her and quirks one eyebrow up.

“On a Friday?” Scarlett’s more perceptive than Sarah, and Kiara looks away as she shrugs one shoulder. 

“That’s what I told Sarah, at least.” Kiara says, and Scarlett nods like she understands. 

Kiara is distracted enough by her conversation with Scarlett that she doesn't notice as Sarah stumbles down from the coffee table and grabs a drink from the kitchen. When Sarah pops up in front of Kiara, smiling apologetically and holding out a cup, Kiara jumps in surprise. 

"Vodka soda." Sarah says, as she pushes the cup into Kiara's hand. Kiara sighs, taking a swig of the drink. Kiara tries not to think about how they hadn’t even seen Dennis yet, and they’d been at the party for an hour. She downs a third of her drink. 

"So I know you didn't want to come, and I'm sorry I dragged you here." Sarah says as Kiara wipes her mouth with the back of her hand. Kiara smiles slightly, wrapping an arm around Sarah's shoulders. 

"Anything for my best friend." Kiara says, and Sarah beams up at her. 

"Then how about you put your mopey face away and come dance with me?" Sarah asks, grabbing Kiara's hand. 

"I am not mopey!" Kiara says, her voice aghast, but it’s lost to the sounds of the party as Sarah drags her away from Scarlett and into the living room. 

Kiara begrudgingly follows Sarah, chugging down sips of the vodka soda as Sarah and her clamber onto the coffee table to dance. Miraculously, the guilt eating away at Kiara’s stomach fades with each sip of alcohol, the music in the room drowning out the guilty conscience in her head. An hour into the party, she doesn’t even remember why she was sad in the first place. 

Kiara barely makes it home by noon the next morning. At some point last night, Dennis and Sarah had talked, and he gave her some lame excuse about _needing some space_ but now he’s _ready to commit._ Sarah had bought it hook, line, and sinker, and Kiara and Scarlett had spent the rest of the night trying to convince Sarah that it was a terrible idea. Neither Kiara nor Scarlett got anywhere with her, and Sarah was tentatively referring to Dennis as her boyfriend. 

It made Kiara want to gag. 

Somewhere between 3 A.M. and sunrise, the three girls made it home to Tanny Hill and passed out in Sarah’s room. Kiara had woken up with a violent headache, and she’s still not sure if it was from Dennis or the copious amount of vodka she had the night before. 

Either way, Kiara leaves Tanny Hill with the intention of going home and sleeping for a few hours before making her way to the Boneyard. She’s not sure there will even be a party tonight, but she’s hoping luck will be on her side and she’ll find the boys. If she does find the boys, she’s going to need her full mental capacity to jump through the hoops of apologizing to the Pogues. She needs to be running at 100%, or at least hovering in the high 80s. Right now, it feels like she’s running at, like, 2.5%. 

By the time she trudges up the steps to her house, she’s already dreaming of collapsing into her bed. She loves staying over Sarah’s house, but sleeping on her bedroom floor is _not_ pleasant. Kiara feels like she needs a chiropractor. 

She opens up the door to her house after a slight struggle with the lock, only to be faced with her father. Mike’s sitting at the kitchen table, facing her and watching as she comes through the door. It’s a little odd, but Kiara doesn’t pay much mind to it. She’s far too tired to worry about why her dad is being weird. 

“Hey dad.” Kiara says, hanging her keys on a hook by the door and slipping her shoes off. She has every intention of making this conversation as short as possible. 

“Want to explain to me what this is?” Mike as, and Kiara looks to where he’s pointing. 

Her breath catches in her throat. 

_Fuck._

Mike is gesturing to the six beer cans that are sitting on the kitchen table in front of him. The six beer cans Kiara stole from the fridge the day before. Kiara had hid them before she had gotten in the shower, and then completely forgot about them when Sarah had called. In between straightening her hair and picking out a new outfit for the party, it hadn’t even crossed Kiara’s mind to return the beers to the fridge where she found them.

Clearly, that had been a mistake. She curses herself again. It would have taken all of five seconds to return the beer to the fridge if she had just thought about it. She could have avoided this entire confrontation if she hadn’t been so wrapped up in Sarah’s drama. 

“Um, beer?” Kiara says bluntly, too tired to go for anything but a snarky response. She really, really doesn’t want to have to deal with her dad right now, especially if he’s angry with her. Between the drama with Sarah and her own issues with the Pogues, Kiara feels like she’s barely holding herself together. The last thing she needs is Mike - or, even worse, Anna - on her tail about stealing alcohol. 

“Do not get fresh with me, Kiara.” Mike snaps back. “What was it doing under your bed?”

“What were you doing snooping in my room?” Kiara responds with an equal amount of venom in her words. 

“I noticed some beers missing from my fridge.” Mike says, standing up and leaning on the table. “Got a little worried about you, clearly for good reason! Didn’t expect my daughter to be stealing alcohol from me so she can go drinking with her friends.”

“Dad, you’re overreacting!” Kiara yells at him, and she’s running through ever explanation in her brain. She can’t tell her dad the truth - he’d blow a gasket if he knew she was bringing the beer to the Pogues. She also can’t lie to him, because she’s a fantastically bad liar. 

“No, I am not!” Mike says, slamming his hands down on the table. “You aren’t going to end up like those alcoholics on the Cut, Kiara! You are not going to start drinking at 15.”

Kiara has half a mind to tell him just how wrong he is, how she spent the majority of last night downing vodka sodas with Sarah Cameron, a girl decidedly not from the Cut, but she bites her tongue. Arguing with her dad by admitting she’s drinking is _not_ the way to win this particular fight. 

“Dad, they aren’t even opened! I didn’t drink them!” Kiara tries instead. Mike doesn’t buy it for one second. 

“Oh, so you were just going to leave them under your bed? For what? For decoration?” Mike scoffs, crossing his arms over his chest. “You’re going to need to come up with a lie far better than that to get out of this, Kiara.” 

Kiara’s about to go off on her dad - she doesn’t have a perfect excuse yet, but she’s angry and she’s tired and the ever present guilt about her Pogues feels like it is crushing her. Maybe fighting with her dad isn’t the best option, but Kiara’s dying for someway to release all her pent up emotions, and her dad is offering her the perfect option. She’s about to open her mouth to yell back at him when she hears the front door open behind her. 

Immediately, all the fight Kiara had in her disappears. Kiara doesn’t even need to turn around to know that her mom is home, and it’s like a manifestation of her worst nightmares. Sure, Mike is overprotective, and he’s mad about the beers - but Anna is a whole other story. Kiara knows that her mom is going to flip her shit, and once Anna knows about the beers, Kiara’s going to be locked in her room for weeks. To Anna, this is going to be equivalent to the highest form of betrayal. The second Anna sees the beers on the table, the entire conversation is going to nosedive. 

Kiara tenses as her mom enters the house, greeting both her husband and daughter. 

“What’s going on here?” Anna says as she puts her purse down. If Anna senses the tension in the kitchen, she doesn't show it.

Mike stands up a little straighter and points to the beers on the table. “I found these under Kiara’s bed.”

Mike had been hoping to get the truth out of Kiara before Anna got home. He wants to know exactly what her plan was with the beers so he could be more vigilant in the future, but now that Anna’s home, Mike knows Kiara is going to clam up. If Kiara was going to bring the beers to the Cut, there is absolutely no way she’ll admit that to Anna. 

Whatever Anna's reaction is going to be, Kiara's terrified to see it. She remains standing with her back to her mom, tensing as the words leave her dad's mouth. She's fully prepared for her mom to lose her mind. 

“Oh, Mike. Chill out.” Anna says, and Kiara looks at her dad as he visibly falters at Anna’s words. Kiara finally turns to face her mom, her jaw dropping to the floor as she realizes that her mom is completely serious.

“Excuse me?” Mike says, his voice betraying his complete sense of disbelief. Kiara feels like she is in a fever dream.

Anna shrugs. “She’s having fun, Mike! She’s a high schooler - the beers aren’t even open!” 

Mike and Kiara both stare at Anna like she has three heads. Neither of them could have imagined the conversation going this way, and neither is equipped to deal with it. Kiara looks at her dad in shock, and for a second, the stolen beers are forgotten. For a second, Mike and Kiara look at each other and wonder if Anna got possessed by a ghost. A ghost who’s _really lenient_ about underaged drinking. 

“Anna -” Mike says, shaking his head and trying to come to terms with this new, weird development. “This is bigger than the beer - she lied to us, and she hid it from us. She was probably planning to go to a party with it.”

Kiara keeps her mouth shut as she thinks _I went to a party without it, actually._

“I went to a few parties in high school too, Mike! And I know for a fact you were always at those beach parties as a high schooler.” Anna says, winking at Mike playfully as she moves to stand next to him. She puts an arm around him as she turns to face Kiara. “Look, Kiara, you can’t lie to us. We want to know what’s going on with you! But -” 

“Anna, what if she was going to the Cut with these?” Mike interrupts, turning to look at his wife. His voice has a sense of urgency to it, like he doesn’t want to play this card but Anna has forced his hand. 

Anna tenses next to Mike, removing her arm from around him. She looks at Kiara for a minute, and then back at Mike. “She wasn’t.” Anna says, though her voice sounds doubtful. “You weren’t, were you?” Anna addresses Kiara. 

“No! I didn’t go anywhere with them!” Kiara says, because it’s not exactly a lie. She had planned to go to the Cut with the beers, but she didn’t end up following through with the plan. Maybe if Kiara tells enough half-truths, she’ll get out of this mess. 

There’s no such luck. It seems like Anna must sense the lie, because her shoulders drop slightly as she nods. Anna looks up at Mike, nodding. 

“No phone for two weeks.” Mike says once he gets Anna’s approval, and Kiara opens her mouth to protest. Mike doesn’t give her a chance. “You’re grounded - extra shifts at the Wreck.” 

“You can only have Sarah over.” Anna adds. Mike looks at his wife in disbelief. “Sarah is a good influence for Kiara.” Anna explains. 

Kiara wants to scream at them that she just got through a night of binge drinking with Sarah, that Sarah is no more of a good influence than the boys are, but she stops herself. Admitting that she went to a party with Sarah last night will only make her parents angrier and her punishment more severe. If she tells her parents how her and Sarah spent the night, they won’t allow Sarah over the house. Even though Kiara wants to protect the boys from her parents judgement, she also needs to keep Sarah around to survive. 

“Fine.” Mike finally relents, breathing out a huff of air. He holds out his hand, gesturing for Kiara to hand over her phone. “Whatever. Sarah can come over. That’s it.” 

“No!” Kiara says, clutching her phone to her chest. She spent last night with Sarah because she _promised_ herself that she would apologize to the Pogues today. Without her phone, or the ability to leave the house, apologizing will be impossible. She can’t go another day, much less two weeks, without apologizing. This charade has already been going on for far too long - if she waits two weeks, it’ll be impossible to reach out to the boys. “I need to apologize to the Pogues!”

“For what?” Mike nearly yells. “For not supplying the beer?”

“No, Dad! I have talked to them in a while, and I feel really bad!” Kiara says, and she sees her dad soften just slightly at her words. She can almost see it - if she puts enough pressure on him, if she blames her behavior on a guilty conscience, she can see her dad breaking just a little bit, just enough to let her apologize before she’s under house arrested. “Please, please just let me apologize to them!”

“You can apologize in two weeks, when you get your phone back.” Anna says, ripping Kiara’s phone from her hands. Kiara looks at her mom, and she notices that while her dad was softening to the thought of letting Kiara apologize, Anna was absolutely not. She can see it in Anna’s expression - Anna’s pleased that Kiara hasn’t been talking to the Pogues, and she’ll do whatever she can to keep Kiara from talking to them. As Anna hands the phone to Mike, he nods. Kiara feels like screaming - there’s no way she’s getting her phone back now that her parents have it. She lost whatever ground she had. 

  
  


\----------

  
  


“Ward Cameron.” Says a gruff voice behind him, and Ward turns towards the sound of the voice. 

Ward had spent the last few weeks tracking down any and all information he could find on the Royal Merchant. After Kiara had given him the idea, he had scoured the internet, watched every documentary - hell, he’d even went as far as visiting the Kildare Historical Society museum. The old ladies who ran the Historical Society hadn’t been as useful as he thought - he had spent an hour with them, trying to figure out what they knew about the ship wreck. By the time he had left the meeting, he felt he was more confused then when he entered it. Each of the women had a different story, and each of them were certain that they were right. 

Ward had gotten exactly nowhere with his search. He quickly found out that everywhere he looked, there were conflicting stories and reports. It didn’t matter if he was reading through pages of online forums or sitting in the museum - there were only two answers to every question he asked: no one knew the answers, and the only person who might actually know is Big John Routledge. 

Ward’s finding out pretty quickly that Big John Routledge is the go-to guy when it comes to the Royal Merchant. Everyone who knows anything about the shipwreck points him in the direction of Big John. Most treasure hunters are off-islanders, or they give up after a few months of searching, but not Big John. Big John was born and bred in the Outer Banks, and had lived his entire life on the Cut. He’s been living in the same shack by the marsh for twenty years, and he’s been searching for the Royal Merchant just as long. As far as anyone can tell, Big John is the closest anyone’s ever been to finding the gold, and he’s not actually that close. He just has a few more maps and a trail of papers he’s amassed in his years of study. 

Despite Big John’s lack of success, it’s the best bet Ward Cameron has. Not even that - it’s the only bet Ward Cameron has left. Ward doesn’t want to split the treasure with anyone else, but given everything he’s found on the subject, he knows his only hope is Big John. 

“John Routledge, I presume?” Ward says, sticking his hand out for John to shake. John grunts in confirmation, shaking Ward’s hand exactly once before letting go. He’s a tall man with glasses that take up half his face and an overgrown mane of hair. He’s simultaneously exactly and not at all like what Ward expected.

“I go by Big John.” He says, and Ward nods. Ward has learned no to ask about the nicknames on the Cut. Once, before he moved to the Academy, he made the mistake of asking about the origin of Old Man Brick’s nickname. He learned quickly that some questions are better left unanswered. 

“Big John, then. You can call me Ward.” 

“What’d you ask me out her for, Ward?” Big John asks, crossing his arms over his chest. Ward isn’t shocked by Big John’s gruff manner, or his lack of pleasantries. The way in which Big John conducts himself is par-for-the-course on the Cut. Ward may have spent the last 30 years in the high society of Figure Eight, but that doesn’t mean he’s unfamiliar with the mannerisms on the Cut. Sometimes, he even finds it refreshing. If he was talking to another developer, or some debutante from Figure Eight, this conversation would take twice as long to get to the point. Ward sometimes appreciates the way people from the Cut dive straight to the point. 

“I’ve been doing some historical research.” Ward says, putting his hands back in his pockets. “Local history and all that. I was told you were the man to talk to.”

Ward catches himself before he leans on the railing of the pier. It’s been years since he’s been down to Pelican Marina, but he still knows better than to lean on the old wooden railings. They were old when he was a kid, and now they look like one strong breeze away from total collapse. He’s shocked that they can withstand the countless hurricanes they’ve endured over the years. Ward had to oversee a project to replace all the Island Club’s piers last summer after a particularly violent hurricane - and they were only a few years old.

Big John scoffs at his words. “You were told wrong.” He says as he turns to walk down the pier, away from Ward. 

“It’s about the Royal Merchant.” Ward yells down the dock after Big John, and that catches his attention. Big John turns around halfway, like he’s still contemplating whether or not it’s worth his time to stay and listen to Ward. Ward is going to do everything in his power to make it impossible for Big John to turn away. “I’ve heard you’re the closest anyone’s ever been to finding the treasure.”

“That’s a bold statement.” Big John says, shaking his head but turning to face Ward. “No one knows if there is any treasure.” 

“You do.” Ward says, taking a few steps closer to Big John. He’s got him hooked, Ward can tell. Now, Ward just needs to sell Big John on the fact that they need to be partners - if there’s one thing Ward can do, it’s sell. “You know. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have dedicated twenty years to the search.”

“Maybe I’m just a crazy treasure hunter.” Big John reasons, sizing up Ward. At Big John's words, Ward nods a little bit. 

“It’s possible, but I don’t think so. I know you’ve been at this a while, and I respect your work, I really do.” When Big John remains silent, Ward decides to show his hand. “I think your research would be made significantly easier with a little bit of capital.”

This grabs Big John’s attention. “What are you saying, Ward?”

“I’m saying that the closer you get to the treasure, the more money it’s going to take. I’ve got funds I can move directly to your search. A significant amount of money. Do you need a new boat? Scuba gear? I can get that for you. Today, even.” 

“What’s in it for you?” 

“We’d be partners. I get you the supplies you need to succeed, to finish this research. We both benefit when you find it.” Ward explains, and Big John contemplates it for a second. 

Big John has the search for gold narrowed down to two places - he’s pretty sure he found the location of the shipwreck. Either the gold is at the shipwreck, or it’s hidden somewhere on Tanny Hill plantation. He needs to search the shipwreck - he’ll need an underwater drone to find the ship, something that could drop over a thousand feet. It’ll be expensive, something he won’t be able to afford without saving up for months, maybe years. Big John could also do with a new boat - the Amy Marie isn’t holding up like it used to. 

Big John’s still tempted to say no - he’s very, very tempted. This search has been his solo mission for years. He’s ruined friendships, his relationship with his wife, and his own life trying to find this gold. His relationship with John B has been disintegrating before his very eyes as he continues his search - he's lost far too much to let anyone else in on his research. The Royal Merchant is his thing. 

On the other hand, taking Ward’s offer is a guaranteed fast track to the gold. Ward will make this easier than Big John ever dreamed possible - if Ward can hand over a little money, Big John can find the gold, and then he can start repairing his relationship with John B. If he can end this quest sooner rather than later, he’ll be able to start a semblance of a normal life with John B. They won’t have to worry about food or rent, they won’t have to go to sleep hungry and wake up starving.

There’s another temptation that Big John has been thinking about. He hasn’t really allowed himself to delve too deeply into the thought, but if he could get the money, he might be able to adopt JJ. It’s not like he’s a model parent or some saint on earth, but with a couple million dollars and whatever house he wants, he could make a good case to remove JJ from his current living situation. Everytime JJ comes to the Chateau with new bruises, Big John thinks briefly about going to DCS. He’s relentlessly googled DCS and the process of legally adopting a kid to no avail. He knows JJ doesn’t want to be ripped away from his friends - it would only make JJ angrier, and JJ doesn’t need angrier. JJ needs some support and a sense of home. Big John hasn’t been able to bring himself to remove JJ from the little family he’s created for himself.

If Big John could make a good enough case for adoption, well, he wouldn’t have to decide between keeping JJ safe and keeping JJ happy. Him, John B, and JJ could live together on Figure Eight, and JJ wouldn’t have to worry about Luke anymore. Big John’s willing to pay Luke a large settlement to get him to agree to let the kid go. He’s not sure how legal that is, but he’s also not sure how much he cares. If he can get JJ out of that situation, he will. 

It’s the temptation to give John B and JJ as good a life as possible that has Big John nodding his head. Big John’s running out of money - he won’t be able to make next month’s rent without Ward’s help. This is Big John’s last chance, he’s either going to find the gold, or lose everything - his boys, his livelihood, and quite possibly his mind.

Besides, if the gold isn’t at the bottom of the ocean, Big John knows exactly where it is - it’s hidden somewhere on Tanny Hill plantation. If Denmark Tanny really did escape the shipwreck and abscond with the money, it’s going to be somewhere on his land. This isn’t the first time Big John’s been approached about partnerships, but the fact that the current owner of Tanny Hill is staring him in the face, offering up his own services to help Big John find the gold, isn’t lost on Big John. If the gold isn’t on the shipwreck, then Big John will have no choice but to team up with Ward Cameron to get the gold. He’ll need legal assurances if it gets that far, but Big John will cross that bridge if they get there. Right now, a helping hand from Ward Cameron is something he’s going to need to accept blindly - once he rules out the shipwreck, he’ll worry about next steps. Working with Ward means this case could be solved in a month. 2 weeks, maybe.

“I’ll need a new boat. An underwater drone. It’s going to need to be able to drop more than 1000 feet.” Big John says, nodding his head. Big John doesn’t want to relay too much information to Ward - if Ward know that Denmark Tanny was the key to the Kingdom, there wouldn’t be much need to keep Big John in the picture.

“Yes, of course! Consider it done - I have an old fisherman’s boat all ready to be purchased. You can take a look at it tomorrow. And I’ll get on the drone right away - I’ll have it here in a week.” Ward says, speaking quickly and approaching Big John. When Ward’s within an arm’s reach, he claps Big John on the shoulder.

“I guess this makes us partners.” Big John says uneasily, holding out his hand. 

“I’m glad to be doing business with you, Big John.” Ward says as he shakes Big John’s hand. Ward’s voice is far more confident than Big John’s. 

“I’ll be in touch.” Big John lets go of Ward’s hand, backing up and turning to walk down the pier. He’s got a lot to figure out in the next few weeks, he needs to get ready to finish up twenty years of searching, he’s got a few phone calls he has to make. There’s no time to waste.

“Hey!” Ward yells, stopping Big John in his tracks once again. “I heard your boy is good with motors.” 

Big John turns around to face Ward. “He’s learned a thing or two.” Big John concedes, and Ward nods. 

“If he’s got any extra time, send him down to Tanny Hill. I got a boat I’d appreciate his help maintaining.”

“I’ll see what I can do.” Big John says, before he turns around and disappears off the dock. 

  
  
\----------

“Hey, John. Long time, no see.” 

“Hey, Ted.” Big John says, leaning back in his chair in the office. It’s been a while since he talked to his brother, and it’s good to hear his voice, even if it’s over the phone. “How are things in Georgia?”

“Eh, hell if I know. I’m in Florida now.”

“Oh?” Big John says, his surprise seeping into his words. He hadn’t known his own brother moved states - once Big John finds the gold, this is another relationship he’s going to have to repair. “Got sick of Georgia peaches?”

“More like I got sick of the real estate market. Down here in the panhandle, you can sell a McMansion to an old timer quicker than candy to a baby.”

“Isn’t the saying _‘stealing candy from a baby’_?” Big John says, smiling as he tosses a pen up into the air and catches it. Teddy is younger than Big John by about 12 years - a gap that made it difficult to form any sort of friendship as kids, and even more difficult to reconnect as adults. Even though they aren’t as close as Big John might like, he’s still as fond of his brother as he ever was. The kid’s funnier than anyone else Big John’s ever met.

“Yeah, that too.” Teddy says. “So what about you, what has you calling your little brother randomly in the middle of the day?”

“I got a favor to ask, of course.” Big John says, turning around in his chair to make sure the door is closed so John B won’t be able to hear him. He turns back to his desk as Teddy starts speaking again. 

“Ah, shit. Of course you do. No time for family without favors, am I right?”

Big John smiles at his brother’s playful tone. As true as the statement is, there’s no malice behind his brother’s words. Big John has missed his brother’s teasing. “You are, in fact. Look, I’m going to need you to come watch John B for a couple days.” 

“Days?” Teddy questions, clearly not believing Big John’s words. Big John lets out a breath. 

“Maybe weeks.” He relents, finally, and Teddy whistles. 

“Jesus, John I can’t just quit my job.” 

“I know, I know. But hear me out - I think I found the wreck.” Big John says, and he hears Teddy let out a breath of disbelief. He steels himself for Teddy to laugh, but Teddy never does. 

“Holy shit.”

“I know.” Big John hopes his shock isn’t obvious in his tone - he expected Teddy to laugh at him, or not believe him. He didn't quite know what Teddy's reaction would be, but he wouldn't have thought the response would be blind acceptance. Big John should give Teddy more credit. 

“That’s millions of dollars.” Teddy states the obvious.

“$400 million with inflation.”

“Fuck me.” Teddy says, sighing. “Alright, I guess. I mean, you’ll have to comp me for my efforts.” 

“Ten dollars and a pack of Natty Light?” Big John says, smiling as Teddy scoffs. 

“Hell nah, that shit won’t fly no more. When you’re richer than Jeff Bezos, I want a yacht with my name on it.” 

“A couple million, then.” Big John says teasingly. Truth be told, the second he finds the gold, Teddy won’t have to work another day in his life. Best case scenario, he’ll move back to the Island and they can start the surf shop they always wanted. Big John’s got big dreams for the future. 

“Give or take.” Teddy concedes, and Big John knows his brother can see through the teasing. 

“You’ll do it?” Big John asks, because he needs confirmation. His entire search hinges on the next few weeks, and he can’t be worrying about John B. 

“Yeah, I guess. When do you need me up there?”

Big John contemplates it for a second, figuring out in his head the timing of this whole ordeal. He’s not really sure how much time he’ll need to set things up, and he’s not sure when the drone will be delivered. Still, he gives it his best guess. “Sometime late next week. I have one last place I need to look on the water before I start searching on land.” 

“Wait, hold up a second.” Teddy says. “I though you said you found it?”

“I almost have.” 

“What the fuck does that mean?” Teddy’s voice is incredulous for the first time in the conversation, and Big John winces at it. He knows he’s asking a lot of Teddy by having him leave his job and head up to the Outer Banks for an indefinite amount of time. 

“It means that I got one last place to look in the water, and if it’s not there, then it’s on land.”

“Isn’t it just easier to check if it’s on land?”

“If it’s on land, it’s on the old plantation property - I want to check the water before I start excavating someone’s backyard.”

“The old plantation property? How the fuck are you gonna dig up Tanny Hill?”

“I have a partner.” Big John says, and he can hear Teddy’s frustration through the phone. 

“A partner? What the fuck does that mean?” 

“I’m not even sure I know what it means.” Big John admits. He’s not trying to piss off Teddy, but he’s doing a mighty fine job of it. 

“Okay, dumbass, how about you answer this one: why do you need me to come watch John B when it’s just one more excursion?”

“It’s not for when I’m on the excursion.” Big says. “It’s for when I find the gold.”

“Holy shit, John. Stop speaking in fucking riddles.” 

Big John’s trying not to freak out Teddy, but he eventually decides that Teddy’s going to find out the truth one way or another.

“This new business partner of mine … he’s shady. He’s got some weird back door deals. He’s from the Cut, but he’s the richest Kook on the Island now.”

Big John had spent the last few days looking into Ward Cameron, and he was pulling up some shady shit. The more he learns about Ward, the less he likes being partners with him. Ward Cameron is a ruthless businessman, and he’s not going to be stopped when he wants something. Big John is worried about what will happen to both him and John B if they get caught in the cross fire.

“Derelict turned Kook? Yeah, the motherfucker probably dabbles in black magic.” 

“Nah, I think he dabbles in some dubious legal shit. I have a feeling he might try to get rid of me when I tell him where the gold is. I’ll need to go undercover once I have evidence I found the gold. I’ll need to find a lawyer, write up a contract, whatever. I’ll need a few weeks to negotiate with him, preferably off the island, away from John B. And I can’t have the kid running around without supervision for that long. 

“Shit.” Teddy breathes out. “Alright, I got it. Give me a week and a half, I’ll have my guys trained to work without me. I’ll call you when I know I can come up.”

“Thanks, man. I really appreciate it.” Big John hopes Teddy can hear the sincerity in his voice. The fact that Teddy believes in him enough to risk his job and his security means a lot - Big John can't mess this up now.

“Anything for my least favorite brother.” 

“I’m your only brother.” Big John says, rolling his eyes. 

“Precisely.” Teddy says, before hanging up the phone with a definitive click. Big John smiles down at his phone before snapping it shut. He's got a lot of work to do to make Teddy and his boys proud. 

  
  
  


\----------

  
  
  


Kiara gets her phone back two weeks and some change later - her dad keeps it a few extra days to truly teach her a lesson. 

Kiara doesn’t reach out to the boys. At that point, it’s been nearly two months with no form of contact. If Kiara felt like she was missing a limb before, now she feels like a head without a body. Kiara can’t figure out how to apologize to them, or even how to reach out to them after all this time. She’s certain she crossed a line, something she can’t ever come back from, and in the end, her own fear leads to indecision which leads to inaction. 

She picks up her phone to call or text them a few times, especially in the days immediately following the end of her grounding. As the number of days grows, so does her anxiety about reaching out to the boys. She can’t even imagine how angry they are going to be, so she stops thinking about it. She stops picking up her phone. She’s scared of the fallout, but if she ignores it, it doesn’t exist. 

If she ignores it, everything will be fine. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aw, you guys didn't think I was going to let you guys off that easy, did you?? 
> 
> Next chapter: "Kiara in a Tiara, a horror story by JJ Maybank"


	11. Kiara in a Tiara, a horror story by JJ Maybank

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello!!
> 
> I don't have much to say about this chapter except that we get a little look in the JJ's feelings, and a little look in John B's turmoil, that'll hopefully make their actions makes sense. Also, I completely guessed at Kiara's birthday to make it make sense in the story, and I made her a scorpio. I have a feeling she's not actually a scorpio, but we're just gonna roll with the timeline I've decided on. 
> 
> Also, I made a tumblr! It's, like, completely barren right now, but you can follow me at [ YellowLaboratory ](https://yellowlaboratory.tumblr.com/)!

It doesn’t take long before talking about Kiara becomes taboo around the boys. Even a few days of silence from her is enough to piss off Pope, and after a couple weeks without any contact, he becomes inconsolably angry. 

After months of silence, any time someone so much as mentions her name, Pope delves into a rant about betrayal and broken trust. He doesn’t say what he actually means - that if he had won the scholarship, the Pogues wouldn’t be splintering. He reasons that his own failure is to blame for Kiara’s departure - if he were at the Academy, she wouldn't have drifted so far away. It's an asinine thought to anyone else - the boys would give him hell if he told them how he felt - but Pope can't shake his own guilt. In the first few weeks of silence, he had spent too many sleepless nights going over in his own head how his failure amounted to something so disasterous. Now, after months, his guilt has simmered down to something that more resembles anger. 

Pope sees her sometimes on his grocery runs, hanging around Tanny Hill. He knows the truth - Kiara is never coming back. The guilt and anger settle in his stomach, even stronger than before. He'll remind the boys every chance he gets that she is not coming back.

John B doesn't disagree - he just brushes it off, way too nonchalant for someone in the process of losing their best friend. It worries JJ how nonchalant John B - as the king of evading worried friends and adults, JJ recognizes the way John B's acting. John B has adopted a _'fuck-it'_ kind of mentality - if Kiara doesn't want to be friends, _fuck her._ If his dad wants to disappear with this month's rent money, _fuck him._ He's given up on caring about people or what they do - when the people around him start acting like adults, he'll give them the time of day. 

JJ just keeps saying that Kiara needs time. JJ can’t accept it - or won’t accept it, he’s not sure which. He’s certain Kiara’s going to come back, because she has too. She wouldn’t abandon them.

It’s a common misconception that JJ hates people who leave, and it’s a fair assumption. Obviously, he doesn’t like when people leave - but it’s far from his worst fear. Since he could remember, the most important people in his life - his dad, Big John, his aunt and cousins on the Cut - they would all disappear for certain amounts of time. His dad’s not his favorite person in the world - far from it, in fact - but he always manages to stumble his way home after a while (even when JJ wishes he wouldn’t). Big John has always come home, materializing back into the kitchen after days at sea. His aunts, his cousins, everyone he ever looked up to - they have always disappeared and come back into his life at different intervals. No, JJ isn’t afraid of people leaving. 

JJ is afraid of people not coming back. He was nine the last time he saw his mom, and he hates her down to the core of his being for not coming back.

Kiara wouldn’t do that to him, JJ’s sure of it. At some point, she’s going to come back into his life, she’s going to reappear. Like Big John, or his dad, or any of his relatives - Kiara’s going to walk back into his life at some point, and it’s going to be like she was never gone.

Even though JJ has faith in Kiara’s return, he still wants to help her out as much as possible. You know, give her a little nudge. Knowing Kiara, she’s overthinking everything, and if JJ had to bet, he’d say she’s too nervous to just show up and apologize. 

Well, if Kiara needs a nudge in the right direction, JJ’s going to give it to her. His plan is vague and complicated - it involves him spending a full afternoon trying to figure out what the fuck _astrology_ even is. After hours of searching, and googling, and confusing ascendant and air signs, he has very little to show for it - he doesn’t know how Kiara finds this useful when it’s so damn convoluted. 

Eventually, he just downloads a stupid app that does all the work for him. He knows Kiara’s a Scorpio, because he knows her birthday, but the more specific questions throw him off. What time was Kiara born? JJ ends up guessing, typing in 6:05 AM because, fuck it, Kiara feels like a morning baby. He hopes guessing doesn’t completely screw with whatever the fuck a _birth chart_ is. 

He reads her horoscope everyday for weeks, trying to find out what might be going through Kiara’s head. He hasn’t decided if he believes in astrology or not - like God, or the concept of algebra, JJ doesn’t allow himself a lot of brain power for the abstract. He’ll buy into it when he feels like it, and he’ll opt out for the same reason. It doesn’t really matter if he thinks it works, anyways. Kiara thinks it works, and she puts a lot more stake into horoscopes than JJ would ever feel comfortable with. Whatever the case, it’s enough for JJ - if Kiara believes in it, it will have to ability to change her mind, and that’s all he needs. 

He reads every horoscope every morning, taking in every bit of information. He tries to find a clue as to whats going on in her head, but it doesn’t come that easily. He finds a lot of advice for slowing down, for not taking on too many activities, for trying to maintain a balance in life, and JJ doesn’t find any of it helpful. 

It’s weeks before JJ finds something worth a damn.

_As a Scorpio, you have a strong sense of loyalty to friends and family. Take time today to reach out to loved ones who you may have drifted from._

Well, shit. JJ couldn’t have written a better horoscope himself. He didn’t know what he was looking for when he started looking into the horoscopes, but by god, he found it. 

JJ already knows that Kiara has read this horoscope. It’s the perfect time to strike - if he shows up in Kiara’s life today, there will be no way she’ll avoid him. She buys way too much into the stars. He decides to stop by the Wreck after school - he doesn’t know Kiara’s schedule anymore, but his best bet is to find her at the Wreck. He can even make it look like happenstance, like he just happened to walk into the Wreck for a burger when her stars are telling her to reconnect with him. 

  
  
  


\----------

  
  
  


“If Denny doesn’t ask me to Cotillion soon, I’m going to explode.” Sarah says from behind Kiara.

“Who the fuck is _Denny?”_ Kiara asks, turning to look at Sarah, who just smiles at her.

“My boyfriend.” Sarah reminds her, and Kiara tries not to show any outward sign of disgust. 

"You're boyfriend is Dennis." Dennis is still far from Kiara's favorite person, but she's trying to play nice for Sarah's sake.

"It's a nickname, dumbass." Sarah says, rolling her eyes good naturedly.

Kiara’s about to respond when she shoves open the door to the Wreck with her hip. She has a snarky comment ready, but it dies on her tongue when she’s met with the back of JJ Maybank’s head as he sits at the counter. Her mind completely freezes for a second, before she mutters _fuck_ under her breath. She can’t believe her Co-Star _predicted_ this. Kiara's always put a lot of weight into astrology, but this is insane. When she saw her horoscope this morning, she thought about reaching out to the boys, but had ultimately let her fear over power her belief in astrology. But JJ Maybank showing up at the Wreck when she’s supposed to reach out to old friends? Jesus Christ, someone needs to give the people at Co-Star a raise. They are truly doing the most.

Of all people, JJ is talking to Kiara’s _mom._ She’s shocked to see Anna leaning over the counter, talking excitedly with JJ about something or other, and then _laughing_ at something JJ says. As if Anna hadn’t spent years trying to dissuade Kiara from a relationship with the boy. Kiara feels like she’s hallucinating. JJ’s shoving fries in his mouth while talking with his hands, recalling some story or another that Anna is enthralled by. He’s surrounded by a sea of plates - hamburgers, fries, onion rings, milkshakes. 

“Kiara?” Sarah says from behind her. “Are you okay?”

That catches Anna’s attention, who’s eyes light up as she sees Kiara in the doorway. She stands up, wiping her hands on a towel and points at JJ. 

“Kiara! Look who it is!” Anna says, and Kiara’s incredibly confused by the smile on her mom’s face. She stares at her mom for a second, trying to figure out how Anna had a fundamental change in personality since breakfast. Her mom has hated JJ and the Pogues since Kiara brought them over in fifth grade - she wonders what kind of divine intervention JJ traffics in to have her mom smiling at him now.

She shakes her head, turning her attention to JJ. He’s already looking at her, as if to assess her reaction to him invading the Wreck. She’s seen John B and Pope from a distance in the last couple of weeks - John B working on the Cameron’s boat, Pope delivering groceries - and she’s done her best to avoid them when she sees them. She’s ducked into stores, hidden in Tanny Hill, and worked in the back of the kitchen in the Wreck when necessary. She hasn’t directly faced any of the boys in weeks, and she’s terrified of JJ’s reaction. On the other hand, JJ did come to the Wreck, for no other obvious reason except food. He’s on her territory by his own choice - Kiara doesn’t know what that means. 

She hasn’t been this close to one of the boys in months. She’s shocked to see he’s taller, his hair is longer, his skinny muscles are starting to fill out. It’s shocking to see how much JJ has changed in such a short amount of time, but the most shocking thing about him is that nothing really changed - the easy smile he gives her is as familiar to her as the sun. 

“Hey, Kiara.” The words break Kiara out of her shock. JJ’s tone is calm and even, and she misses the trepidation in his eyes. 

Something about the way he says her name rubs her the wrong way. The way he’s calling her by her name, rather than her nickname, strikes her as a challenge. The fact that he’s not calling her by the name he gave her reminds her how distant they’ve become. She covers up her shame and sadness with anger. 

“Hey, John.” She says in retaliation, moving around him to go behind the counter. Her tone is cold, because she fully expects this to be the true end of their friendship, and she really, really doesn’t want that to happen in the middle of the Wreck. Truth be told, she doesn’t _ever_ want it to happen, but it seems like she might have made her bed and now she’s got to lie in it. 

Kiara’s mom looks at her sharply, as if she can tell Kiara’s being cruel despite her perfectly pleasant greeting. She reminds Kiara to make sure JJ has whatever he needs before another customer waves her down.

JJ, for his part, just smirks as he shoves another fry in his mouth. “I still go by JJ around these parts.” He explains as Kiara’s mom exits the counter. 

“I still go by Kie. In all parts.” Kiara retaliates, her tone still cold. Sarah tentatively follows Kiara behind the counter, watching JJ with worried eyes. Normally, she would sit where JJ’s currently seated, and bug Kiara while she works. Something about Kiara’s tone tells her she might need back up, and Sarah wants to be behind the counter in case Kiara needs moral support. Sarah's pretty sure moral support is all she'll be able to provide - if Kiara needs back up in a fight against JJ, Sarah's gonna have to call Mike over. JJ's got a vibe about him that tells Sarah he's seen his fair share of fights, and he's not accustomed to losing them. 

“Oh.” JJ says, looking at Kiara in shock before he nods his head. “Yeah, I - uh - I just thought - cause your mom kept calling you Kiara, that you might not go by Kie anymore. My bad, Kie. I didn’t mean anything by it.” Kiara looks at him, deflating as he stumbles over his words. The more he speaks, the more she feels like a bitch. “Honest.” He says after a moment. 

“Yeah, I’m sorry, JJ.” JJ looks at her like he wants to ask her what she’s sorry for - for ditching him for months? Snapping at him as soon as she sees him? Calling him the wrong name? Instead of asking, he just nods and takes a sip of his coke, staring at her as he waits for her to continue. “Do you, uh, want anything else?” She asks as she wipes down part of the counter.

“Yeah.” JJ says, picking up a balled up napkin and throwing it at her. “For you to stop being so fucking awkward.” He says as she bats the napkin away, shocked by JJ’s nonchalance. “And an order of onion rings.” 

Maybe it’s not back to normal - maybe it’ll never go back to the way it was - but there’s something about JJ’s demeanor that feels like an invitation. Maybe it’s an invitation to come back, or try to mend the holes she dug in their relationship. Maybe it’s just an olive branch of understanding - maybe JJ, and even the rest of the Pogues, understand how crazy her life has become and how tired she is from trying to juggle it all. Maybe, if she went back to them, they’d accept her again. 

When Kiara sees JJ tug on his friendship bracelet, she almost loses it. It’s a subtle gesture - she’s not even sure he recognizes he’s doing it. JJ has a few ticks, and one of them is playing with his bracelets. As Kiara watches him, she tugs on her own bracelets - the ones she still stubbornly refuses to take off. Sarah refers to the bracelets as _‘bohemian’,_ which roughly translates to _‘ugly in a cool way’_ in Sarah-speak. Sarah refers to a lot of Kiara’s old clothes as _‘bohemian’._

Despite Sarah's gentle displeasure at the bracelets, the only way Kiara can take off her bracelets is to cut them off, and that’s something far too permanent for her taste. She can take off and put on her necklaces and her old clothes, but the friendship bracelets aren’t the same. Even if they are the most _bohemian_ bracelets on the planet, and they straight up offend Sarah, Kiara won’t ever cut them off. The fact that JJ’s still wearing his bracelets means something. It has to - right? The fact that he hasn’t cut them off is a good sign. Does it mean he feels the same way she does? Does it mean he understands her?

Kiara doesn’t quite know what it is, but it feels like some sort of emotional release. Like she bottled up all her fear and anxiety and it’s been quietly brewing in her for weeks, but with one smile and quick taunt from JJ, it disappears into thin air. She smiles back at him, a kind of soft, honest smile she hasn’t felt in weeks. 

Sarah, on the other hand, is completely horrified by the exchange. She doesn’t know much about the Maybank kid, except Kiara was best friends with him and he has a reputation that follows him like a dark cloud. Sarah can’t believe Kiara would interact with someone like this - someone who is rude and impolite in a restaurant like the Wreck. She can’t believe Kiara’s laughing with him. She watches in confusion as Kiara throws the napkin right back at JJ before turning and ordering an _‘extra large plate of onion rings’_ from her dad. 

“To go, please!” JJ yells after her as she finishes the order, and Kiara relays the message to make sure her dad gets it. Once her dad confirms the order, Kiara settles back in her place across from JJ and next to Sarah. 

“You got somewhere to be?” Kiara questions, and JJ nods. It looks, for a second, like he’s going to delve into something deeper, like he’s ready to lay a whole spiel down on Kiara. His eyes catch Sarah’s at the last minute, though, and the words die on his lips. Something about Sarah - like, the fact that she exists at all - reminds JJ of the fact that Kiara hasn’t been around, and there’s certain things JJ doesn’t trust her with anymore. Nevermind that the Kook Princess is standing right next to her, and there’s no way JJ’s going to divulge Pogue secrets in front of her.

“Yeah -” JJ says awkwardly. “It’s - uh - I’m gonna bring ‘em to John B. Gotta keep that boy alive somehow, am I right?” 

JJ’s scratching the back of his head like he’s keeping something from Kiara. Kiara’s familiar with his body language - JJ keeps just about everything from just about everyone. A year ago, she would have had the option to ask him about it, or to call him out on it. Even then, she usually chose to respect his privacy and not bug him about things he would rather keep to himself. Now, she doesn’t have a choice. She doesn’t feel brave enough to pry - she’s pretty sure she lost that privilege. 

“You must be Sarah?” JJ says suddenly, changing the subject with all the grace of his many years of practice. Sarah looks shocked that JJ is talking to her. 

“Uh, yeah.” She says in response, looking at Kiara as if she needs confirmation that she can talk to JJ. “That’s me. I go to school with Kie.”

JJ nods at her, looking like he’s taking in that information. Acting as though it’s not something he’s been acutely aware of for months. “And, uh, how are things at the Kook Academy? Going well? Classes kicking your ass?”

JJ says it lightly, almost absentmindedly, as he picks at the fries in front of him. If Kiara didn’t know him better, she would assume that JJ was making polite small talk, trying to engage both Kiara and Sarah in a conversation. But Kiara does know him better, and she can see the silent question in his eyes, directed only at her - _Are you okay? Are you surviving? Is this Kook protecting you?_

“I’m going good.” Kiara says, hoping to convey the answers to his questions without letting Sarah in on the silent conversation. “You know, schools actually going … pretty well.” She finishes the sentence with a smile, hoping it can get her point across. JJ beams back at her, so she knows he gets the message. 

“Yeah, Kie’s even on the shortlist for the Winter Cotillion Court!” Sarah says, breaking JJ and Kiara out of their subliminal conversation. Kiara bangs her head on the countertop as the words leave Sarah’s mouth, groaning out loud as JJ laughs so hard he snorts soda up his nose. 

Kiara knows that Sarah’s just trying to be helpful, but she wishes she could shove the words back down her throat. It’s not that Kiara’s upset that she’s on the Cotillion Court - honestly, she’s kind of excited. She’s more excited about the implication of the court - the court is elected by the student body, and her place on the court represents the acceptance she’s garnered from the Kooks in a very short amount of time. She’s excited because being on the Court means she belongs at the Academy, and she belongs with Sarah and her friends. Hearing her name called in the list of finalists had left her speechless - she knew people tolerated her because of Sarah, but she didn’t think the general student body would vote for her above any of her classmates. She was pleasantly shocked. She’s not as excited for the gown she’s going to have to buy, or the campaign she’ll likely have to put on for votes, but that doesn’t take away her excitement at being elected in the first place. 

All that being said, Kiara could have died happy without the Pogues knowing about the Cotillion, much less the fact that she was elected to the Cotillion Court. She could have died happy if no one on the Cut knew about Cotillion - honestly, even this brand new Kook Version of Kiara isn’t too fond of the idea. Kiara still thinks it’s pretentious, no matter what Sarah says, so she knows the boys would tease her mercilessly over it. 

Kiara lifts her head to look at Sarah as JJ chokes on his drink. Sarah looks horrified at the immediate and violent reactions both Kiara and JJ had to her words. She looks at Kiara like she wants to apologize, but she doesn’t know what she did wrong. Kiara waves off whatever apology was going to come out of her mouth - Sarah didn’t do anything wrong. No, this particular disaster is completely Kiara’s making. 

“Oh my god.” JJ says once he can breath again. “Come again? Kiara Carrera is going to be on what?”

JJ eyes shine with laughter as he stares intently at Sarah, waiting for her to repeat herself. Sarah looks back and forth between Kiara, as if she’s not sure how to move forward with the conversation. 

“She’s going to be on the Winter Cotillion Court.” Sarah says slowly, her expression and tone both thoroughly confused. JJ turns his stare to Kiara while barely containing his laughter, and Kiara avoids his gaze by pretending to be busy wiping the counter down. 

“Kie?” He prompts after a minute, but the question comes out more like a laugh than anything else.

“Alright, yes!” Kiara says, throwing her hands up, tossing the towel she was using behind her. She moves her hands to her hips and tries to keep her composure as she says “Yes, I’m thinking of joining a fucking Cotillion Court.” 

This sends JJ into a full body laugh - he leans back in his seat, holding his stomach, laughing so loudly some of the patrons nearby stare at him. Kiara swats at him, telling him to be quiet, trying desperately not to break into giggles with him. There’s something about JJ’s laugh - the light, airy, boyish giggle that he makes when he’s really laughing - that’s impossible to resist. Kiara tries her best, but his laugh is incredibly infectious. Pretty soon, she can’t help herself, and she’s laughing right along with him. 

“Oh my fucking god, Kie.” JJ says after he barely composes himself. “Do you get a crown?”

Kiara shrugs a little, still smiling, and turns to Sarah. JJ does the same, and Sarah looks at both of them, completely confused by everything that has happened in the last 10 minutes. 

“Uh, yeah. A tiara, actually.” Sarah responds because, duh, it’s a Cotillion Court. Of course there will be tiaras. This sends both JJ and Kiara into another giggling fit, and Sarah stares at them in shock.

“Wooh,” JJ says, wiping his eyes. “Sarah, Kie, that’s the most I’ve laughed in a while. Kie in a tiara. Fucking priceless, man, am I right?” JJ directs the last question at Sarah, who just shrugs at him because she doesn’t really understand what’s going on. “Sarah, I’m gonna need a favor. I need you to get me pictures -”

“Oh my god, stop being an asshole.” Kiara says, still laughing, but JJ continues on, undeterred. 

“Name a price, I’ll pay it. As many pictures as you can get. You hear me?” JJ says, smirking as Kiara tells him to _fuck off._

Sarah opens her mouth to tell JJ the pictures will all be available on the _Kildare Gazette’s_ website for free, but she snaps her it shut at the last minute. Given the nature of this conversation, Sarah’s pretty sure Kiara won’t appreciate JJ having that information. 

“Kiara! Onion rings are up!” Kiara’s dad yells from the kitchen, and Kiara disappears for a second to collect the box. When she comes back, she hands the largest box of onion rings the Wreck offers to JJ.

“Aw, thanks, babe.” JJ says as he takes the box, and Kiara reaches over to flick him on the forehead for his comment. He just winks at her. “How much do I owe you?”

Kiara doesn’t even bother looking at the pile of food he amassed - she responds automatically. “You already know you don’t owe me anything. All my friends eat free at the Wreck.”

It’s silent for a moment as JJ takes in what Kiara just said. Kiara realizes, with a start, that JJ’s surprised she still considers him a good enough friend to eat at the Wreck for free. Her heart shatters just a little bit. 

“I’d argue with you, but I never fight with free food.” JJ says, standing up after the awkward beat of silence and trying to dispel whatever weird tension was created in the Wreck. “I better get these to John B before they get cold.” 

“Tell him I say hi.” Kiara says without really thinking, and all JJ’s work to dispel the tension is for naught. In a second, it feels even more awkward between the three teenagers than it did before. Kiara recoils at her own words, realizing how empty and stupid it is to tell John B _hi_ after three months. When she looks at JJ again, it’s the first time she’s seen him angry since she walked into the Wreck. 

“Uh, yeah. I’ll be sure to tell him I ran into you.” JJ says with an awkward cough, and Kiara’s heart sinks to her shoes. Kiara can tell that JJ has absolutely no intention of doing anything of the sort. Her shoulders sag slightly with her disappointment, and JJ immediately tries to overcorrect. “Or, you know what? Why don’t you come to the Boneyard on Saturday? Bring some of your school friends, we’ll get a keg. It’ll be great.” 

It’s a terrible idea, a truly awful idea - bringing Kiara and her new friends to the Boneyard? When John B’s in a pissy mood and Pope is the way he is? JJ wants to swallow the words as they come out of his mouth. He’s literally never had a shittier idea in his entire life - and JJ has had no shortage of shitty ideas. The only solace lies in his certainty that there’s no way Kiara would ever accept his invitation, so he’s just opening himself up to disappointment. If she did accept his invitation - well, JJ can’t imagine a scenario where that goes well. 

Then, Kiara’s face lights up. It breaks into a million-watt smile, and she tentatively says _‘yes’._ She turns to Sarah, as if looking for confirmation, and Sarah shrugs. 

“Yes! JJ, that’s a great idea!” Kiara says, once she gets a bit of confirmation from Sarah. It’s absolutely not a great idea, but JJ’s not going to be the one telling her that. “Sarah, we could definitely go!”

“Yeah, yeah.” Sarah says, more because Kiara is so excited by the idea than any real intention to go. “I know a couple friends who go down there on the weekends. It’ll be fun.” 

“Then it’s decided.” JJ says, drumming his hand on the edge of the counter as he turns to leave. “Kiara in a Tiara. It even fucking rhymes.” He doesn’t see the middle finger Kiara sends the back of his head. He pushes the door to the Wreck open with his hip and throws up two fingers in a goodbye. “See ya Saturday, Kook Princesses!” 

There’s no malice in JJ’s tone, none at all, but something breaks in Kiara’s heart when she realizes JJ sees her as a Kook. 

“I thought you were excited about Winter Cotillion?” Sarah asks as Kiara watches JJ’s fading figure. 

“I was.” Kiara says wistfully, lost in her own heartbreak. She hesitates for a moment, and then adds with more certainty, “I am. It’s just … sad when things change, you know?”

A hundred feet away, JJ mutters _I’m such a fucking idiot_ to himself. Now he has a kegger to plan, and he’s got to find some way to tell Pope and John B that Kiara’s coming to the Boneyard when they have no interest in talking to her ever again. _Fuck._

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annnnd the next chapter will be "Two Kook Princesses and the Battle of the Boneyard"


	12. Two Kook Princesses and the Battle of the Boneyard

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright y’all, I need to apologize: last chapter, I made a mistake. I’ve decided since posting that chapter that I’m moving John B and Big John’s fight to later in the story. I’ve gone back and edited it out, and you’ll be seeing a very similar (probably the exact same) scene in coming chapters. I wanted to make this work with canon, and I can’t have Big John disappearing in February when the show basically says he goes missing in or around September (nine months before the start of the show, which is in summer). So, I went back and edited it out. Literally nothing else has changed, except the small references to John B and Big John’s fight. Sometime soon, I'm going to be editing some of the dialogue between Uncle Teddy and Big John to help it flow better with the new timeline, but for now, the fight scene is the only thing that is changing. So, like, can we just agree on temporary memory loss? Or maybe a sneak peek into future chapters? Really, really specific foreshadowing? I’d be very appreciative. 
> 
> Also, thank you to my lovely new beta reader lemon_drizzle_cake for your help with this chapter!

“Why would you invite her?” Pope asks for the seventh time, and JJ sighs loudly from where he’s sitting on the dock. He doesn’t make any effort to respond, instead choosing to flick his newly acquired lighter open and closed a few times. “She’s a traitor.” Pope adds, trying to get a rise out of JJ.

“Man, shut up,” JJ says, standing up. He’s full of anxious energy, and fiddling with the lighter isn’t enough. He starts pacing the dock, his steps heavy.

JJ knew John B and Pope wouldn’t be happy that he invited Kiara, but he held out some stubborn hope that he could win them over with the promise of an unexpected kegger. It hadn’t been easy for JJ to pressure one of the upperclassmen into getting a keg, and he expected at least a little appreciation for his efforts. So far, both Pope and John B seem exceptionally unappreciative.

“This is Kie we are talking about,” JJ adds after a second. Sometimes, it feels like JJ’s the only one who remembers that before she was _Pogue Enemy Number 1,_ Kiara was their best friend.

“Yeah,” John B says, from his spot by the HMS Pogue. He’s dressed in a couple layers of waterproof fabric as he hoses down the boat. “Kiara. Who abandoned us.”

“Exactly!” Pope says, gesturing wildly with his hands, pointing between John B and JJ. “Thank you!”

It takes a lot of effort for JJ to bite his tongue - it’s not something he’s normally used to doing. He’s been keeping the boys in the dark about how miserable Kiara really was during her first semester at the Academy. It's not JJ’s place to spill all of Kiara’s secrets, even to Pope and John B. Maybe even especially to Pope and John B, when they are so hell bent on painting her as a traitor. 

It’s getting harder by the day for JJ to keep the secret, though. Sometimes he wonders what would happen if he told John B about that night on the Pogue, when Kiara talked about her life like it was inconsequential. If John B and Pope knew what JJ knew, they wouldn’t be acting like such assholes. 

Or maybe they would. He’s not actually 100% sure of that. The angrier the boys get, the less he’s sure of how they’d respond. He kept Kiara’s secrets at first out of respect for her, but then, as time wore on, because he's scared that the boys will act like whatever Kiara was going through was no big deal. Like it wasn’t an _end-of-the-world_ moment, like JJ’s blood has no business to still run cold, even months later, at the mere memory of that conversation.

Sometimes he wants to get mad at Kiara, sometimes he wants to get upset and just forget about her. It feels like that might be easier - that hating her and letting her go would be easier than worrying about her from afar, being cautiously hopeful that one day she might come back. But he can’t do that - hating her, that is. JJ knows that Kiara’s just trying to survive and he, better than anyone, understands that need all too well. 

JJ doesn’t say any of that, though. Instead, he just shrugs a shoulder. “Look, she was miserable at the beginning of the year, and now she’s got some new friends and she’s not miserable anymore. She needed some time to adjust, but I think she misses us.”

JJ believes what he says. Talking with her at the Wreck seemed like old times, and JJ stubbornly believes there’s something left to salvage there. There was no way she was faking her excitement to come to the Boneyard, and the only reason she’d be excited to come is to try and make amends with them. They’ll be okay again, JJ’s sure of it.

“Oh, did she tell you that? _JJ, oh, I missed you so much!”_ Pope says in the worst imitation of Kiara’s voice that JJ’s ever heard. JJ rolls his eyes, stopping his pacing to shove Pope a little bit. 

“Shut up,” JJ says as Pope makes a move to shove him back. 

John B drops the hose and steps in between the two of them, a hand on each of their chests to stop them from fighting. He turns to JJ with a pointed look. “Do you honestly think she’s going to show up?”

Hypothetically, JJ had thought about what would happen if Kiara didn’t show up. Given her track record over the last few months, she’s more likely to skip out on the party than not. JJ had thought about not even telling the boys about the invitation he extended to Kiara - if she showed up, it would be a (hopefully) pleasant surprise. If she didn’t, JJ could continue on like he never talked to her in the Wreck, and the boys would be none the wiser. He had toyed with the idea until he decided that Kiara surprising the boys was much more of a volatile situation, and he could at least run a little bit of interference beforehand if he told the boys. If she doesn’t show up now, he just looks like an idiot.

He’d also be pretty upset if she didn’t show up - he doesn’t want to be under some illusion that tonight could fix everything, but he can’t help it. Kiara coming back to the Boneyard feels like it should fix something, maybe even everything. He’s got a lot of hope, and he’d bet his last dollar that Kiara will make it. 

He’s not about to promise anything to the boys, though. 

“If she doesn’t show, what’s the loss? We have a kegger one way or the other. Kiara might show up, or she might not. Either way, it’s cool,” JJ says, trying to appear more nonchalant than he feels. Pope just shakes his head at JJ. 

“No, not cool.” Pope’s tone is defiant as he crosses his arms in front of his chest. JJ narrows his eyes at Pope.

“Alright,” John B says, surprising both of them. JJ stares at him, seeing John B’s resolve crack in front of his eyes. 

“JB?” JJ questions, and John B sighs.

“Alright,” he repeats. “We’ll see how this goes.”

Pope throws his hands up, stomping away from the pair and muttering under his breath. John B looks at JJ, and JJ can tell John B doesn’t have a lot of faith in his hair brained scheme. 

JJ thinks he can already tell how this is going to go. 

  
  
  


\----------

  
  
  


Kiara is struggling hardcore. She’s been trying to pick out an outfit for the Boneyard party for an hour, and she has no idea what to wear.

It’s not like Kiara to worry about an outfit - or, at least, it never used to be. The New Kiara that goes to the Academy and social events on Figure 8 sometimes stresses about what to wear, but she usually leaves decisions like that up to Sarah. Sarah has a frankly ridiculous talent for pulling together a perfect outfit out of thin air, but not even Sarah could help Kiara with the impossible situation she's gotten herself into.

The thing is, a Boneyard party this time of the year would normally call for a baggy shirt, ratty jeans, and a fleece lined windbreaker to fend off the winter air. But that’s not going to work today - she can’t wear something that screams _“Pogue”_ around her Kook friends. She’s trying to actively avoid becoming a social outcast again, and she’s not about to remind all her new friends of her precarious position among them. She also can’t wear any of her Kook clothes, because she’s trying to apologize to the boys tonight, and she can’t exactly appeal to their good graces while dressed like Sarah Cameron’s right hand woman. It’s a disaster.

She wishes, not for the first time, that Sarah and her were going to the Boneyard alone. If it was just Sarah, Kiara would feel comfortable wearing any of her Pogue clothes, and this entire endeavor would be infinitely easier. 

Instead, Kiara and Sarah are going to be rolling up the Boneyard with a small army of Kooks. Kiara doesn’t know what Sarah said to Dennis, Olivia, and Scarlett to convince them to come to the Boneyard, much less Rafe, Kelce, and Topper. She’s not even sure she really wants to know. She just knows that Sarah had told her they couldn’t go to the Boneyard without _‘back up’_. Kiara had scoffed at that – the only _‘back up’_ Kiara would ever need are the boys, and she certainly doesn’t need Rafe Cameron as her second in a fight. 

The fact that Sarah even thinks they need back up makes Kiara’s stomach churn. The more she thinks about it, the more it feels like a disaster about to happen. She wishes she could go back and tell JJ she just wants to visit them at the Chateau, or put her foot down and demand Sarah univite the other Kooks, but she can’t. Not now, when there is less than 2 hours until the party. She can’t back down after telling JJ she’d be there. If there’s ever going to be a chance of her getting her boys back, now is the time. 

Which means Kiara has to pick an outfit to wear. 

Kiara groans loudly on her bed, flopping over onto her stomach. She looks at the vast array of colors in front of her and she wants to scream. If the perfect outfit could just materialize in front of her, that’d be great.

“Everything okay, honey?” Anna asks from the hallway. Kiara’s about to dismiss her, tell her _‘yeah, I’m fine’_ and then continue to suffer in silence, but something gives her pause. Maybe her mom could help. Anna’s not as stylish as Sarah, and maybe that’s exactly what Kiara needs. 

Kiara flops back over on her bed as her mom peaks her head through the doorway. “I have nothing to wear,” Kiara states.

“I … disagree,” Anna says, gesturing to the wide array of clothes Kiara’s currently laying on top of. 

“No, mom. I need a _specific outfit,”_ Kiara says, standing up in the least graceful way possible. Anna looks at her, smirking a little.

“Oh, do you have a date?” Anna teases, and Kiara just groans out loud again.

“No, _Mom._ I’m going to a bonfire with Sarah, and it’s on the beach, and I can’t find an outfit!” Kiara says, her hands going to her hips.

“Why don’t you wear this?” Anna says, picking up a floral dress that Kiara’s become a fan of in the last few months. 

“To a _bonfire?_ On the _beach?_ In _February?”_ Kiara says incredulously, and Anna just laughs. “This is serious, Mom, and if you aren’t going to help, you should leave.” 

“Alright, alright, I’m only teasing,” Anna says, setting the dress down. She starts picking up clothes and folding them, inspecting every piece until she dismisses it.

“Who’s going to be at the bonfire?” Anna asks casually.

“Sarah, Scarlett, Dennis,” she says, and then she pauses, weighing her options before continuing. On one hand, she could lie to her mom and never say anything about the Pogues. Her mom wouldn’t ask too many questions, because Sarah’s involved, and Kiara could definitely get away with it. On the other hand, Kiara’s desperate to figure out if her mom’s opinion on the boys has really changed - JJ and Anna’s interaction at the Wreck hasn’t left Kiara’s mind. “JJ and the boys,” she finally adds. 

“Oh,” is all Anna says, her displeasure showing immediately and obviously on her face. Kiara quirks an eyebrow at her. 

“Mom, what the hell?” She blurts out. Anna turns to look at her sternly, but Kiara continues on, undeterred. 

“You were fine with JJ at the Wreck,” Kiara reminds her mom. “You were talking with him! What, did you suddenly and very briefly forgot you weren’t supposed to like him?”

“I always liked JJ,” Anna says without any hint of irony.

“Yeah, okay,” Kiara scoffs, and Anna hits her with a look. Kiara just stares back, challenging her mom to tell her that she’s wrong. Anna spent five years telling Kiara that JJ and the Pogues were a bad idea - there’s no way she’s getting away with lying to Kiara now.

“I haven’t always … approved of those boys,” Anna finally relents after a minute, moving back to fold some more of Kiara’s clothes. “JJ just surprised me at the Wreck.” 

“What does that even mean?” Kiara asks, moving to help her mom fold clothes. 

“He was just very polite,” Anna says, and Kiara snorts. _JJ_ and _polite_ don’t belong in the same sentence. “I guess I’ve never really talked to him before. We had a nice conversation. I always expected him to be a little more … rough around the edges.”

JJ is definitely _rough around the edges_ \- in fact, JJ just might be _rough all around._ Kiara is more confused now than she was before she started the conversation, but she can tell that her mom isn’t going to be more specific. “So what? He’s fine at the Wreck, but he’s not fine at a bonfire?” Kiara presses on. 

“I didn’t say that - I just think Sarah is more your speed. But I guess having a bonfire with both of them would be good. That kid could use some positive influences,” Anna says, and Kiara tries not to roll her eyes. JJ does need some positive influences, but they sure as hell aren’t going to come in the form of Sarah, Dennis, and Rafe. “I was just surprised. He reminds me of …” 

“Reminds you of what?” Kiara prompts when her mom trails off, and Anna grimaces a little, like she wishes she hadn’t said anything. She hesitates for a moment, but finally relents.

“He reminds me a little of your dad. When I knew him in high school.” Anna says, despite her reservations. Kiara makes a gagging noise. 

“Oh my god, mom. _Stop_ ,” Kiara says, holding her hands out. She really, really doesn’t want to hear her mom compare JJ and her dad. She knows the story of her parents - Mike was always around, working long shifts at all the biggest restaurants he could manage. At one point, he was managing four different part-time jobs to save up for college. Anna frequented the restaurants, and they weren’t friends, but they definitely weren’t enemies. She didn’t see him for a few years when they both left for college, but one summer, they both happened to be back, and they hit it off. A few years later, they were married and opening up the Wreck. Kiara knows that the intervening years between their wedding and her own birth weren’t exactly pretty - Kiara’s Grandmother is far from the most understanding woman on the planet. Whatever it was, it was all behind them now that Mike and Anna had reinstated themselves with the Island Club and Kiara was going to the Academy. 

Anna shakes her head, an eyebrow raised. “You asked, Kiara.” 

“No, what I asked for was help with an outfit,” Kiara remarks, gesturing to her bed. “Can we please get back to that?” 

Anna just laughs at her helpless face.

“Alright, a bonfire you say?”

  
  
  


\--------

  
  
  


The bundle of nerves in Kiara’s stomach grows as Rafe’s car gets closer to the Boneyard. It’s like the closer she gets, the more obvious it becomes that she’s on the precipice of a disaster. If it felt like a mistake when she was picking out an outfit with her mom, this entire adventure now feels like a catastrophe. She has no feasible way to back out now - not when her, Rafe, Sarah, Topper, and Kelce are packed into a car with Denny, Olivia, and Scarlett tailing behind them. She’s too far gone and she has no idea how this could possibly go well. 

Since she’s been friends with Sarah, she’s been trying to convey to her exactly how important the boys are in the making of Kiara Carrera. She tried to explain it through the nights on the pull out couch, the days spent surfing, the hours sitting around a campfire. Sarah doesn’t seem to get it - she seems indifferent to the stories of mischief and mayhem, the times Pope and Kiara played doctor when the other two boys got into too much trouble, the times Kiara would have killed for any of the boys. Sarah doesn’t get it, and Kiara doesn’t know how to make her understand. 

She doesn’t tell Sarah everything. She doesn’t tell Sarah about absentee fathers and the pressure Pope is constantly under from his family, or the times she’s cried to the boys and they’ve fought for her. She doesn’t talk about Pope’s scholarship loss and the devastation they all felt, she doesn’t talk about the food she left in hidden cabinets and the refrigerator so the boys could survive. Sarah wouldn’t get it, and she’d never get it. She’s never spent time on the Cut, she’s never experienced life through the boy’s eyes. Maybe someday she’ll understand, but as of now, she’s perfectly happy in her bubble wrap and Kiara is hesitant to break her out. As Rafe’s car approaches the pull off, Kiara wants to vomit. For the first time in the last few months, Kiara doesn’t want Sarah here. She wishes she told Sarah to fuck off, wishes she just came to the Boneyard alone, as daunting as that sounds. Anything would be better than the force of impending doom she feels. 

Rafe parks the car and looks through the rearview mirror at her. 

“This the place?” Rafe asks, and Kiara can’t speak. If she opens her mouth, she’s going to scream at them all to leave. She just nods. 

“Alright.” Topper says, unbuckling his seatbelt. “Let’s get this shit show on the road.” 

  
  


The first thing Kiara does when her feet hit the sand is bee-line for the keg. She needs something to calm her nerves, and she gulps down a cup of beer with shaky hands. She asks for another before Sarah even catches up to her. 

Kiara gets distracted by helping Sarah, Olivia, and Scarlett get drinks, and then, before she knows it, there’s an invisible line drawn in the sand. There’s a boundary, and on one side stand Kiara and the Kooks, and the other holds the Pogues. They intermingle for beer, but the two sides stay mostly separate. She doesn’t know how to break it down. 

The boys - even JJ - don’t indicate that they even know she’s there. She’s certain they know, because she just rolled up with a small army of kooks, but it feels like the boys are trying to actively avoid acknowledging that. 

It takes 45 minutes for Kiara to even get the courage to cross the line - she spends enough time listening to Dennis and Sarah talk about Cotillion dresses that even her fear of a fight is overshadowed by her need to go somewhere else. She’s also highly aware that every second she spends on the Kook side of the party, she’s defining herself as one of them. It’s enough to prompt her to get out of her seat.

Kiara excuses herself from discussions of ballgowns and bow ties, downs the rest of the beer she’s holding, and makes her way over to find the boys. She needs to talk to them now, when she’s slightly buzzed and a little bit braver. If she makes some headway now, it’s going to be so much easier to make amends.

The Pogues are sitting around the fire with a few early-season tourons and a handful of other students from the Cut. Pope is the first one to see her as she approaches, lifting himself from his seat and heading towards her. She knows the set of his shoulders, the crinkle between his eyebrows - Pope is mad at her, and he’s looking for a fight.

“Did your Kook friends start to bore you?” He says by way of greeting, stopping a few feet away from Kiara. He’s still in the light of the fire, and Kiara can see the harshness of his eyes even in the muted light.

“Hey, Pope,” she says, rolling her eyes. She’s not going to engage with him, but she can’t help a little sass slipping into her words. The beer was just strong enough. “Nice to see you too.”

“Whatever,” Pope scoffs, clearly deciding she’s not worth it. He turns back to the fire, stalking away from her.

“Yo, I know I’ve been MIA for a few months, but I want to talk to you guys!” Kiara says to Pope’s back, taking long steps to catch up with Pope. He stills suddenly, enough that Kiara nearly collides with his back. He turns around to face her fully.

“You don’t get to decide to come back whenever you want,” Pope seethes, his words dripping with venom as he looks down at her. 

He walks away from her just as suddenly as he’d stopped, and she’s too stunned to retaliate. She knew the boys would be angry, but JJ’s calm demeanor at the Wreck had given her some hope. She was still in JJ’s goodwill, and she was hesitantly hopeful that Pope and John B would feel the same way. If JJ wasn’t mad at her for leaving, she figured there was hope for the other two boys. She was expecting some anger - especially since she rolled up in a Kook parade - but she certainly wasn’t prepared for Pope’s outright hostility. Pope had never talked to her like that before, not once in the years they’ve known each other. 

Kiara shakes herself out of her shock, following Pope until the edge of the fire. Now she wants to fight back and argue with Pope, but she’s forced to a halt as the rest of the Pogues notice her. JJ raises one arm - the arm not wrapped around a Touron - in a greeting. 

“Beers in the keg over there, Kook,” Travis says from his seat next to John B, and Kiara nearly snarls at him. She can see how she could be mistaken for one from the outside, but Travis fucking _knows_ her. Calling her a Kook in front of her boys? Kiara wants to snap at him. 

She waits a minute, allowing time for any of the boys to tell Travis to fuck off, but none of them do. JJ remains silent, just giving Travis a look - which is still more than John B does.

“I’m not a Kook,” Kiara seethes through gritted teeth. At that, John B outrightly laughs.

“Alright, sweetheart. Whatever you say,” John B says, a condescending smirk on his face,and every muscle in Kiara’s body clenches. John B has never called her _sweetheart_ in her life, though she’s heard him use the term a few times during fights to rile up his opponents. The implication of him using it against her - as if she’s an enemy of his - has her blood boiling. 

“JB.” JJ’s warning comes through clenched teeth as he leans forward to make eye contact, but John B ignores him. 

“Shut up, JJ.” Pope interjects, and JJ rolls his eyes at him. He turns briefly towards Kiara, shrugging his shoulders like _‘what are you going to do?’_ and Kiara takes it as a hint to try and de-escalate things. 

She doesn’t get the chance.

“Hey, Kie!” Kiara hears Sarah shout from behind her, and Kiara tenses up even more, if it’s at all possible. This situation is incredibly delicate, and it’s only going to be more precarious with Sarah added into the mix. 

“Ah, the Kook Princess is calling,” John B says, waving his hand as if to brush Kiara off, and Kiara sees red.

“Stop being an asshole, John B,” Kiara tells him, and John B stands up from his seat so quickly that the Touron sitting next to him almost falls off the log. 

“Oh, you want me to stop being an asshole?” John B says, approaching Kiara. Pope and JJ jump up on either side of John B as he speaks. “You showed up to our party with your new friends. I’m not sure I’m even capable of being more of an asshole than that.”

JJ tries to get between the two of them, trying to calm down both parties before a true disaster strikes. JJ trying to mediate is a rare sight on the Outer Banks, and unfortunately, he's really shitty at de-escalation. 

“Are you angry that I have other friends, John B? Is that it? Are you jealous?” Kiara bites back, ignoring JJ’s calls to calm down. 

“Guys -” JJ tries to intervene.

“I could care less about you and your Kook friends,” John B snarls at her. “I’m mad because you come around here acting as if you are one of us!”

“I _am_ one of you! I’m part Pogue!” Kiara is aghast at John B’s accusations, the hurt she’s feeling manifesting as anger at him.

“That’s bullshit, Kiara,” Pope jumps into the conversation despite JJ’s attempts to contain him _._ “There’s no _‘part’_ anything - you’re either a Pogue, or you’re not. You’re either a Kook, or you’re not.”

“ _That’s_ bulshit! I can be whatever I want to be - what, I can’t be friends with you because I go to the Academy? You’re gonna pull a Travis on me now?” Kiara says, and she ignores the way Travis laughs from behind John B. 

“Kie -” JJ says, physically putting himself between her and Pope.

“No, Kiara, you pulled a Cassidy on us,” John B says, crossing his arms. Kiara glares at him, trying to come up with something to say back, when Pope steals everyone’s attention.

“We were never your friends.” Pope says, and Kiara’s so stunned, she’s speechless. 

“Woah - “ JJ says, turning to face Pope fully and push him back. Pope swats JJ’s hands away.

“We were never friends?” Kiara says, trying to hold back the tears forming in her eyes. “Seriously, Pope? What, you were all pretending for five years?” 

“No, Kiara, you were _our_ friend. We were _your_ charity case,” Pope says, and Kiara’s jaw drops at his words. Everyone is silent for a minute until Pope speaks again. “The turtles, the climate, and the Pogues, isn’t that it?”

“That’s - that’s not true!” Kiara stumbles on her words. She can’t believe Pope can say that to her face - she can’t believe Pope sees her that way. The fact that John B agrees with him - she’s in shock. She _loves_ the Pogues. She’d burn down the island for them. They were never a charity case, and the fact that they are accusing her of that - Kiara doesn’t have words to convey what she feels.

“Do you remember when JJ and I got into a fight with Rafe? Because we stood up for you?” John B says, before turning to Pope. “I seem to remember that happening. Don’t you?”

“Uh, yeah, I happened to be there as well,” Pope says, as John B snaps his fingers.

“Guys, this isn’t about Rafe or the fight - “ JJ says, but he gets cut off once again.

“Now, she’s pulling up to the Boneyard with him,” John B says to Pope like Kiara’s not there, and Kiara throws her hands up.

“He gave me a ride so I could come talk to you!” Kiara yells.

“You want to talk? Let’s talk! You want to talk about how you haven’t spoken to any of us in months? Or do you want to talk about how you ditched us everytime we planned to hang out for weeks before that? Where would you like to start?” John B says, his voice mocking. 

“I’m not going to have this conversation if you two are going to be so immature,” Kiara snaps back at him. 

“Whatever, Kie. Why don’t you go hang out with your fancy friends?” John B says as he waves behind Kiara. Kiara turns to see Sarah staring at them from a few feet away, her eyes wide. Kiara whips around quickly, her anger exploding. The fact that John B is making fun of Sarah is enough to make Kiara’s blood boil in her veins. Sarah is her best friend. She knows logically that John B has been her best friend for longer, and has been there for her for longer than Sarah has, but it was Sarah who helped her out through her rough times at the Academy, Sarah who has done so much to help Kiara since they became friends. Looking at John B now, all snark and bitey remarks, she feels like she hardly knows who he is. 

“They are better friends than you’ve ever been!” She finally yells at him.

Even as the words leave Kiara’s mouth, she wants to take them back. She knows, even as she says them, that they aren’t true. No one the planet could be better friends to her than the boys in front of her, and everyone knows it. Hell, even Sarah might know it. They’ve been there for her through the highs and the lows of the last five years, always fighting in her corner. She knows this, but even in the heart stopping silence that follows her statement, she won’t take it back. Sarah is standing behind her, and Sarah is the closest thing she has to the friendship she used to have with the Pogues. She stubbornly stands her ground.

The boys freeze. JJ slowly turns around to look at her, giving her a chance to rethink her statement. Even without looking at him, she feels his burning gaze on her skin, pleading with her to take that back, but she ignores him. She’s locked in a staring contest with John B, who finally scoffs and turns away.

“You should leave,” JJ says, slowly.

“What?” Kiara says, finally looking at JJ. Her voice breaks as she speaks.

“You heard him,” Pope says, louder and more forceful than JJ. Kiara doesn’t look at Pope, she stares at JJ, hoping he’ll change his mind. She said mean things, they said mean things - she just wants to get past this. She came to make amends. JJ knows that, he has to know that.

“Kie …” Sarah says, her voice worried, and Kiara sees the fight from her eyes for a second. The three Pogues are the least menacing people on the planet to Kiara, but from Sarah’s point of view, they look like three delinquent troublemakers that tower over Kiara. It’s only been a few months, but they aren’t the scrawny middle schoolers she left. The boys all stand at over six feet, strong from hours of physical labor and surfing. Kiara has never been, and would likely never be, afraid of the boys hurting her - even in the middle of this fight, even if they aren’t friends, she knows the boys better than to be afraid of them. They won’t hurt her on pain of death, and they’d give anyone who did hell. She’s certain they’d even protect Sarah, given their nature, despite the circumstances. Sarah just doesn’t see them the same way she does, and Kiara doesn’t know how to convey that to her. 

“JJ - “ Kiara says breathlessly, and JJ turns away from her. 

“He said you should leave,” John B says, as if it was unclear. His voice is the coldest Kiara’s ever heard it.

“Alright,” Kiara relents. She doesn’t know where to go from here - she doesn’t know if it’s possible to move on from here. She shakes her head, gathering herself and steadying her voice. “I’ll leave. And I’m not coming back.” 

“Good riddance,” John B says, but Kiara barely hears him. She’s already turning around, grabbing Sarah’s hand and dragging her along as she stomps away from the boys. 

“Didn’t they _invite_ you?” Sarah asks from behind Kiara, desperately trying to make sense of the weird scene she just witnessed. “I don’t understand, Kie.”

Kiara takes a deep breath - she doesn’t really understand either. The anger she feels almost makes her lash out at Sarah, but she stops herself. Yelling at Sarah would do absolutely nothing for her - she’s just lost three friends in the span of fifteen minutes, she doesn’t need to up her stats. 

“I want to go home,” Kiara says through a watery breath, and Sarah nods, looking around the party.

“Yeah, yeah, definitely. I can get Rafe or Denny to give us a ride back to my house - “

“No, Sarah,” Kiara cuts her off, tears finally falling down her face. “I want to go _home._ Sorry,” she adds, because her and Sarah were planning on having a sleepover after the party. Kiara couldn’t handle that right now, she needs a second alone. She’s about to absolutely lose it on this beach - she’s trying not to focus on the hurt right now, but it feels like part of her heart got ripped out of her chest. If she doesn’t get to a car _right now,_ she’s going to crumble to pieces. She hears John B laugh from across the beach, and she squeezes her eyes shut in pain. She reminds herself to breathe and tries not to freak out. 

“No, it’s alright, it’s fine. Rafe - we want to go home!” Sarah says as her brother comes into view. Rafe scoffs at Sarah, like he might give her a hard time, but then he takes one look at Kiara and stops still in his tracks. Rafe was never a fan of Kiara to begin with - back when she started at the Academy, he made it abundantly clear he was not happy to have a Pogue among their ranks. As Kiara and Sarah became closer friends, though, Rafe started to tolerate her. He might even like her, who knows. 

Whatever it is, whether Rafe likes her or not, Kiara knows Rafe is completely incapable of dealing with a girl in tears. Case in point, he just turns, nodding briefly at Sarah. 

“Uh, yeah. What happened?” This entire party was Kiara’s idea, so his confusion at her sudden change in demeanor is understandable. Neither girl answers him, but Sarah motions her head back to the fire the Pogues are sitting at. Rafe rolls his eyes rather theatrically. “Oh, the fucking Pogues.”

That doesn’t make Kiara feel better. In fact, it makes her feel worse, if anything. The tone of Rafe’s voice - dismissive but laced with disgust - as he mentions the boys that are _(were?)_ her best friends is enough to turn her stomach. Rafe talks about the Pogues like they are barely human, and Kiara _hates_ it. Her quiet tears start to break down into heavier sobs. 

Everything is so complicated, and she just wants it to stop. She needs to get off this beach, she needs to lock herself in her room and allow herself a couple of minutes to calm down. She can’t breathe - not with her boys so close but so far away, not while surrounded by the people she’s seemingly chosen over them. 

Rafe doesn’t need to hear anything else - he seems to acknowledge whatever Kiara is expressing. He looks back at Topper, and then nods to his car. “Let’s go, then. This party is lame, anyways.” 

  
  
  


As she walks off the beach, next to Topper and Rafe, with Sarah’s arm around her shoulders, she doesn’t notice that all the boys are watching her. She doesn’t see JJ toss his plastic cup into the fire as hard as he can, turning to both John B and Pope. 

“You couldn’t just talk to her?” JJ yells. “You had to start a fight?”

“She came with the Camerons, dude,” John B says, leaning back in his seat. JJ runs his hand through his hair in frustration, and cuts John B off when he opens his mouth to talk again. 

“Fuck both of you!” JJ yells, storming back to the Chateau before either of them can respond. Pope gets up to follow him, but John B waves him off. 

“Don’t,” John B warns. “He needs to cool off - he was really hoping this would work out.” 

  
  


JJ spends the night out on the hammock, refusing to talk to either John B or Pope until late into the next morning.

Meanwhile, Kiara spends the night crying in her bed, her head hidden under her sheets, trying to figure out how things can go from so great to so shitty in no time at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annnd the next chapter is: "Inexplicably, Caroline Van der Worker Gets Worse"


	13. Inexplicably, Caroline Van der Worker Gets Worse

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello!!
> 
> Here we get a little better look into how Kiara and Sarah feel about things. The next chapter will be more centered around the boys and their feelings, but for now, we’re only getting the girl’s side of things. 
> 
> Also, if any of the death squad is going to get a redemption arc, it’s going to be Kelce. You can pry Kelce’s redemption arc out of my cold, dead hands.
> 
> And thank you again to my lovely beta, lemon_drizzle_cake, for your help with this chapter!

Kiara stares at her reflection in the mirror, trying to force herself to conjure up something equivalent to a smile. 

Lately, she’s been trying to keep up a good face for Sarah, but it's especially important today. Kiara doesn’t want to ruin Cotillion by being a mopey disaster, and she’s actually done a decent job at it so far. Ever since she stepped foot into Tanneyhill early this morning, she's been nothing but cheery and bright. Even when she and Sarah got trapped talking to Rafe in the kitchen about their after party plans, Kiara forced herself to maintain a smile. 

It's harder to pretend when she's staring herself down in the mirror. 

In the week after her fight with the Pogues, Sarah Cameron became Kiara’s entire life. Sarah showed up at her house the next morning, carrying pints of ice cream and a take out box with Kiara’s favorite pancakes from the Wreck. For a solid week, Sarah didn’t leave Kiara’s side - they had a sleepover every night, ate their weight in ice cream, and depleted Netflix’s True Crime collection. Sarah demanded walks on the beach to watch the sunset and waffles every morning. Sarah created a temporary oasis in Kiara's personal shit storm.

The thing is, Kiara knows Sarah still doesn't understand why she’s so sad, and that’s part of what makes Kiara so thankful for her. Sarah didn’t ask her to explain anything, or even to talk. She just accepted that Kiara was hurting, and proceeded to do everything in her power to make Kiara feel better. Sarah always seems to have a sixth sense about her moods – whenever Kiara starts feeling like her heart is breaking all over again, Sarah is there with a smile, or a joke, or an outrageous story that Kiara will half listen to. Somehow, Sarah makes it easier to breathe. 

Kiara’s also insanely grateful that Sarah didn’t drag along her other friends for her week long pity party. Kiara genuinely likes Scarlett, gets along well enough with Olivia, and tolerates Dennis, but she didn’t want to see any of them after the debacle at the Boneyard. And for a full week, Kiara got to have Sarah all to herself. 

Eventually, though, even that came to an end. A week after the fight, when Kiara began to resemble a functioning human, Sarah started inviting the regular crew around again. It's been three weeks since the fight now, and Kiara can put on a good enough show for Sarah to convince her that things are back to normal. 

Internally, though, Kiara still feels pretty shitty. Sometimes she feels better – normal, even – and then, out of nowhere, she’ll see something that reminds her of the boys, and she’ll spiral in her own head until she has to find somewhere quiet and take long, slow deep breaths to calm down. Those moments are getting fewer and farther between, though, and it’s starting to feel like this whole thing might not be the end of the world. In the moments when she can breathe again, Kiara convinces herself that she’ll live through this. People lose their childhood friends in High School all the time. She’ll survive. Middle school is over, and even though it hurts, she has to accept reality. 

The reality is that her and the Pogues were never going to work out. Ever since Kiara became friends with the three of them, people have been telling her that it’s a bad idea. From her own parents, to her teachers, to the Sheriff – everyone has told her the same thing: _those boys are trouble, and they aren’t good for you._ Slowly, heartbreakingly, she’s starting to agree with them. The boys are trouble, and they were the kind of trouble that was fun in Middle School, but feels beneath her now that she’s part of Sarah Cameron’s world. 

She still loves them, she can’t lie to herself about that. Her boys – if she can even still call them that – have been a part of her life for far too long for her to stop loving them all of a sudden. She’s angry at them, and sad, but she still loves them. She thinks maybe, overtime, that will start to fade, too. 

Kiara has a best friend in Sarah Cameron, and she’ll survive on that alone. Sarah’s friendship is different from what she had with the Pogues, but it’s still good. After the past few weeks, Kiara is starting to convince herself it might even be better. Sarah is a person Kiara can realistically be friends with for the rest of her life, in a way that she just can’t with the Pogues.

Pope has always wanted to go to college, and she knows in her heart he’ll make it happen – but he’s way too much of a brainiac for her. He’ll end up going to a school Kiara couldn’t get into, and he’ll be one of the nerds that never leaves the library. John B and JJ won’t go to college – they’ll find jobs around the Cut, maybe boat repairs or the mechanics shop. They’ll stay on the island and never really get out. Kiara has always wanted to leave Kildare, get out and explore the world, meet new people and see new sights. She used to feel guilty for wanting that future for herself when the boys didn’t have the same opportunities, but with Sarah she doesn’t have to anymore. Sarah and her are on the same page on everything. They can travel the world together, when the time comes, and Kiara will never have to worry about her best friend being stuck on this godforsaken island. 

_Unlike her ex-best friends._

Kiara shakes the thought from her head when Sarah comes twirling out of her bathroom, singing along loudly to her _Bad Bitch_ playlist. 

“Woo, Kie, I’m so ready. Do you think - “ 

Sarah stops herself when she sees Kiara’s face in the mirror wearing a sulky expression that she’s too slow to school into something happier. Kiara doesn’t even bother turning around as Sarah approaches her from behind. Sarah threads her arms around Kiara’s stomach, crushing her in a hug so strong that Kiara starts wheezing. 

“No sad faces!” Sarah proclaims, tucking her chin into Kiara’s shoulder. “It’s Cotillion Night.”

Kiara starts laughing, and Sarah loosens her grip around her. She doesn’t remove herself completely, holding Kiara in a loose hug, meeting her eyes in the mirror. Kiara still has a smile on her face – a real one, this time.

“Thanks, Sarah,” Kiara says, placing her hands on top of Sarah’s and squeezing slightly. There's so much to thank Sarah for that Kiara can't even properly process it - instead, she lets the words hang heavy in the air without explanation.

“I’m not just here to make you look like a fucking babe for the dance, sweetie,” Sarah says, shrugging. Kiara laughs again, and it comes easier this time. 

_“I_ look like a fucking babe?” Kiara says, untangling herself from Sarah’s hug and spinning Sarah around so her long dress fans out. “I think you were looking at the wrong person in that mirror.”

“What a good looking pair we make,” Sarah says, finishing her twirl in a bow. She steps out of it, reaching for her phone on her vanity. “We gotta document it for the good people of Instagram,” she adds, moving towards the mirror again.

Sarah tucks herself next to Kiara, holding the camera out so Kiara will take a picture of them. Kiara obliges, and as Sarah hugs her again, Kiara puts on an overly theatrical smile for the camera.

The reflection of the flash blinds her for a second, and she knows one thing for sure: with Sarah by her side, she’ll be fine. 

  
  


\----------

  
  
  


Sarah watches Kiara try to pin the boutonniere on Kelce’s lapel, laughing outrightly when she accidentally stabs him. 

“Sorry!” Kiara yells. “Sorry! I think this damn thing is broken.” 

Kiara turns over the boutonniere in her hands, looking at the pin in the back while Kelce reaches up and tries to help her. Kelce’s smiling, teasing her good naturedly and making Kiara laugh in response, and Sarah’s heart soars at the sight. Kelce asking Kiara to Cotillion was the first time Kiara truly smiled in the weeks since the Boneyard party, and Sarah couldn’t be more relieved to see her friend happy again. She’s missed Kiara’s laugh and the sparkle in her eyes.

Sarah’s still baffled by the disaster that was the party at the Boneyard. Sarah had to put her life on hold for damn near two weeks to help Kiara recover from those douche canoes, and even that wasn’t enough. 

Sarah’s heart aches for Kiara – even though she can’t really make sense of their friendship, Sarah knows those boys used to be important to Kiara. Sarah didn’t have friends like that growing up, and she certainly didn’t lose any friends in a massive blow out on the beach. It may seem foreign to Sarah, but the sadness in Kiara’s eyes when she doesn’t think anyone is looking is clear as day. Even weeks later, Kiara is still torn up from the fight. 

Sarah really, really wishes she was brave enough to go tell those assholes on the Cut exactly what she thinks of them, then rip all three of them limb from limb for hurting Kiara. If they’ve been friends with her since elementary school, they must know as much about Kiara as Sarah does. They have to know that Kiara’s the funniest, kindest, most opinionated person on the Island. Sarah didn’t have high opinions of them to begin with, but after that little show – inviting Kiara and then humiliating her, sending her off sobbing – her opinion tanked even lower. If those three losers can’t appreciate Kiara for the amazing person that she is, they can kick rocks. 

In fact, if Sarah’s really being honest – like, the type of honest that feels wrong – she has to admit that she feels relieved that Kiara’s not talking to the boys, maybe for good. She’s not _happy_ , of course. She wishes, for Kiara’s sake, that it all went down some other way, some way that spared her all the bullshit. Still, if there’s one thing Sarah knows she needs, it’s security – and she definitely didn’t feel like she had a lot of that before. Before this disaster, Kiara had two sets of best friends: she had the Pogues, and she had Sarah. Whenever Kiara called her her best friend, there was always a part of Sarah’s mind that reminded her she wasn’t the sole owner of that title. 

So yeah, Sarah felt threatened by the three boys she’d never met. Whenever Kiara talked about them – which was often – it was with the whimsical nostalgia of an old friendship. Try as she might, Sarah could never compete with that. The boys knew Kiara better, they were always by her side, they were integral to her entire personality and sense of humor. Even after months without contact, it felt like every part of Kiara’s life was somehow tied back to the three boys.

When Sarah met JJ in the Wreck, she was suddenly confronted with an uncomfortable truth: however well she thought she knew Kiara, the Pogues had been there before. And sure, meeting JJ in person made her see a little bit of the allure Kiara felt towards the boys. JJ was hot, but he was also sharp, and funny, and pretty cheery. He seemed like a happy go lucky guy – Sarah hadn’t expected the notorious JJ Maybank to be so goofy. He didn’t seem to have a grudge against Kiara, and he seemed genuinely happy to see her. Seeing the two of them interact, it was painfully obvious to Sarah that JJ knew Kiara in a way she simply didn’t. Their entire exchange gave her the distinct feeling that they were having a different conversation than the one she was hearing, one made of unsaid truths and years-old inside jokes. It wasn’t until JJ extended the invitation to the Boneyard that Sarah started to properly freak out – in fact, as Kiara looked at her with pleading eyes and she tentatively agreed, her stomach was in knots. 

Sarah doesn’t do well with abandonment. Maybe it has to do with losing her mother at a young age, maybe it has to do with her father being more interested in Rose and his construction company than her – whatever it is, Sarah gets scared when she thinks people are going to leave her. She doesn’t act rationally. If the last few months have made anything clear, it’s that the Pogues and Sarah cannot coexist as Kiara’s best friends. She’s incredibly aware that her growing closeness with Kiara filled in the space that used to belong to the boys. If Sarah and Kiara are best friends, eventually there won’t be enough room for the Pogues. But if Kiara’s back with the Pogues… well, there wouldn’t be enough room for Sarah. The prospect of Kiara leaving her for the Pogues is – frankly – terrifying. Sarah had to do something, and she had to act fast. 

Sarah hadn’t consciously meant to ruin the party for Kiara, or at least that’s what she tells herself. Even after her brief meeting with JJ, she knew that a back up team was highly unnecessary, and yet that didn’t stop her from gathering one. She begged her brother to go, bribing him with a promise that she would cover for him whenever he snuck out for the rest of the school year. After Rafe agreed, it was like a chain reaction: Sarah was bribing her friends left and right. She owed a favor to half her lunch table and a majority of her brother’s friends in order to pull it off, and in the end, it wasn’t even worth it – not when it ended up with Kiara sobbing in the back seat of Rafe’s jeep. 

Sarah didn’t know she’d be hurting Kiara so deeply when she was concocting her plan – she didn’t know it would feel like the end of the world for Kiara. A part of her still blames the boys, because even though Kiara rolled up with a whole posse of Academy kids behind her, they had absolutely no right to be so vulgar and mean to someone they called their best friend. A larger part though blames herself. She can’t pretend she had no role in what went down, and she had been woefully unprepared for the repercussions of her own selfishness. 

Whoever is to blame, Sarah can’t take it back now. The past is the past, and Kiara’s adamant that the Pogues are as dead to her as they are to Sarah. It sucks that Sarah feels responsible, but it’s what happened. There’s no way to undo any of it now. And the ugly truth is, despite all the guilt and the remorse, a part of Sarah is not even sure she’d want to. Now, finally, for the first time in their friendship, Sarah feels like they are on even footing. Sarah and Kiara need each other in equal amounts, and Sarah can truly say she feels like Kiara’s best friend. This new sense of stability is like a breath of fresh air, and now that Kiara’s starting to act normal again, things are looking up. In the end they’ll both be better for it, Sarah’s sure of it. 

“Hey, Sarah!” Kiara calls to her, breaking Sarah out of her reverie. Kelce and Kiara are looking at her expectantly, the boutonniere successfully pinned in its proper place. As she reaches a hand out to Sarah, Kiara’s smile is like a sunny day after weeks of gloom. “We want a group picture!”

Sarah smiles back, grabbing Denny and dragging him along. 

Things are okay. Some friendships are meant to end, and some friendships are meant to last forever. Sarah wraps one arm around Denny and the other around Kiara, squeezing both of them closer to her. As Rose snaps a few photos, Sarah’s pretty sure she knows exactly which one she and Kiara are. 

  
  
  


\---------

  
  
  


“You’re gonna be fine,” Kelce says from his seat next to Kiara, and she smiles gratefully at him. She doesn’t know what tipped him off about her nerves, but it was probably the fact that her hands hadn’t stopped shaking since she entered the dance. Kiara’s not sure why she’s so jittery – she’s been on stage for debate club a dozen times, and she’s never been this nervous. Something about the prospect of being judged because of her dress and her makeup, and not her arguments or intellect, has Kiara’s skin crawling.

Kiara’s really, truly glad that it was Kelce who asked her to the dance. Even if he’s friends with Rafe, who is barely tolerable, Kelce just seems mostly harmless. Sure, Kelce tends to get too caught up in what Topper and Rafe think of him, but Kiara’s pretty sure he’s not a bad guy in general. She was shocked when he asked her, but she was also excited. He’s sweet, and cute, and surprisingly funny. He’s the type of guy she could introduce to her parents, and they wouldn’t be devastated. 

“I don’t know why I’m so nervous,” Kiara admits to him. “It’s not like I’m going to win.” 

Kelce hits her with a look. “Don’t say that,” he chastises, and she rolls her eyes. Kiara doesn’t say it out loud, but she knows she’s lucky to even be nominated. A few months ago, the very people standing in this gym would have avoided her like a leper. Being nominated is an honor that Kiara didn’t expect, but it’s too much to hope that she will be crowned Cotillion Queen. She’s fine with that, really, because she doesn’t want to be the Queen. Too many eyes, too many people that only tolerate her because of Sarah. She’s happy to stay quiet in the background. 

“We all know who’s going to win,” Kiara says, sparing a glance towards her best friend. There’s no malice in her voice, and in fact Kiara smiles widely at the sight of Sarah twirling around the dance floor with Dennis, the strobe lights sparking over the little tiara on her head. Kiara is wearing a matching one, just like every member of the Cotillion Court. _Kiara in a tiara,_ just like JJ predicted. If only he could see her now. 

She squashes down that thought – lately, whenever she thinks of JJ she can’t help picturing his face as he told her to leave the Boneyard, the resolve in his eyes that felt like JJ was resigning himself to a life without Kiara. She hated the look on his face, but it’s seared in her memory. If she thinks about it too long, she’s going to start crying again. 

“I don’t know,” Kelce says, blessedly distracting Kiara from her thoughts. “I didn’t vote for her.”

Kelce takes a sip out of his soda, looking at Kiara intently. She doesn’t know what to make of the look, it makes her feel self conscious and a little giddy at the same time. She tucks a strand of hair behind her ear to give her hands something to do, and she suddenly wishes she didn’t ask to leave the dance floor. At the time, spinning around in circles with Sarah had set her already tense stomach into spin-cycle mode. Now, it feels like it would be so much easier to play it cool if she were up and dancing with her friends. 

“Oh, look,” Kelce exclaims as the head of the Cotillion Committee, Mrs. Henry, takes the stage. “Here we go!” 

“Hello, everyone! If I could have your attention, I would like to introduce you to this year’s Cotillion Court!” Mrs. Henry says, far too enthusiastic for a teacher staying late on a Friday to chaperone a dance.

Mrs. Henry goes through the list of names one by one. Kiara tunes out the male Cotillion Court members, because Kelce is too old to be nominated, but she starts paying attention when it gets to the girls. 

“... Caroline Van der Worker, Scarlett Anderson, Sarah Cameron, Kiara Carrera …” 

Once Mrs. Henry says her name, Kiara kind of goes on autopilot. Kelce cheers loudly as she stands up, but it doesn’t give her the confidence she so desperately needs right now. Despite her shaky legs and dangerously tall heels, Kiara manages to get herself on stage without tripping or otherwise embarrassing herself, and she stands next to Sarah in the lineup. 

Sarah grabs Kiara’s hand once they are next to each other, squeezing it slightly in a sign of support. Despite Sarah’s reassurances, Kiara doesn’t hear Mrs. Henry’s speech, or the applause from the crowd. She doesn’t hear anything, until -

“ - this year’s Cotillion Queen is … Sarah Cameron!” Mrs. Henry says, and Kiara breaks out of her daze as Sarah squeals next to her. She turns to Sarah, hugging her quickly before Sarah moves to accept the new, larger tiara and a bouquet of flowers. It’s a whirlwind of movement as Dennis wins Cotillion King, and the court is ushered off stage. Kiara manages to get somewhat lost in the melee of the court, ending up on the opposite end as Sarah and Dennis have their dance as Cotillion Queen and King. Despite the fact that Kiara thinks Dennis is a deadbeat, she smiles fondly at the two of them dancing. It’s everything Sarah wanted for Cotillion, and Kiara’s happy for her. 

Near the end of the song, Kiara feels Kelce approaching behind her. She turns around to tell him _‘I told you so,’_ but she’s shocked into silence when she sees that it’s not Kelce standing behind her. It’s Rafe. 

“Lucky win for her,” Rafe says, nodding to his sister, and Kiara tries not to look at him funny. There’s something about his smile that seems both familiar and terrifying, but Kiara can’t quite place it. His smile, coupled with the fact that he’s standing just a little too close to her, unnerves Kiara. 

“What the hell, Rafe?” she says as she backs up, nearly running into one of the empty tables. She wants to get away from him, but the further she backs up, the further she’s putting herself into a literal corner. They are in a more secluded part of the gym, away from the lights and the speakers. Suddenly, Kiara feels very, very uncomfortable. She can’t even see Sarah anymore – Rafe is blocking her line of sight. 

“You coming to Topper’s tonight?” he asks, but there’s something off about the way he’s looking at her. Looking at her isn’t the right term – he’s looking _through_ her, like she’s not even there. She knows Dennis and Topper snuck alcohol into the party – she’s had a few sips of Sarah’s “water” bottle already – but whatever Rafe’s had, she’s pretty sure it’s not alcohol. She doesn’t know what he took, or why he’s acting so weird, but she really, really doesn’t like it. 

“No – Sarah and I are going to Caroline’s,” Kiara says after a beat. Normally, if she felt this uncomfortable around a guy, she wouldn’t be broadcasting her plans for the rest of the night to him, but this is Rafe. Sarah and her had already told him their plans when they talked earlier in the kitchen – there’s no point in trying to lie to him. 

“Always Sarah and Kiara, huh? Why don’t you come to Topper’s with me?” Rafe says, but the gleam in his eyes says something more. Kiara doesn’t want to know what Rafe might be implying – especially since she came to the dance with his best friend.

“Stop it, Rafe. You’re acting weird,” Kiara says, making a move to shove him away. Rafe only comes closer, crowding Kiara’s personal space. Kiara doesn’t know what to do, but she’s taken some self defense classes, and she grew up with three boys who taught her how to fight dirty. If she needs to, she’ll get herself out of this. 

“I think you’ll have more fun with me, anyways,” Rafe slurs, and Kiara’s about ready to use all of her combined fighting knowledge to kick Rafe in the groin when Sarah interrupts. 

“Rafe? Kiara?” she says, and in an instant Rafe is back to normal – or, as normal as Rafe can ever be. As he leans away from Kiara, the menacing gleam in his eyes disappears, and Kiara stumbles back a step in shock. Sarah looks between the two of them for a second, and Kiara briefly wonders how much Sarah saw. 

“Just letting Kiara know I think she should have won,” Rafe says, turning his back on them and walking away. 

“Asshole!” Sarah yells after him, and then immediately covers her mouth when Mrs. Henry gives her a stern look. She giggles into her hand, then stops when she looks at Kiara. Kiara is definitely not laughing – she’s glaring at the back of Rafe’s head. “What just happened?” Sarah asks Kiara. 

“I… don’t know.” Kiara says honestly. “He invited me to go to Topper’s, I guess?”

Sarah’s eyebrows furrow together in confusion. “But he already knows we are going to Caroline’s.” 

“I think he might be drunk,” Kiara says carefully, and Sarah just rolls her eyes. 

“Oh god, we’re lucky if he’s only drunk,” she says, before looking at Kiara more intently. “Are you good? Did he say something to you?”

“No,” Kiara says, trying to decide if she just imagined that entire weird encounter. “No, I’m good. Just… weird, you know.”

“Oh, trust me,” Sarah says, reaching for Kiara’s hand and dragging her back out to the dance floor where Dennis and Kelce are standing. “You don’t have to tell me that my brother is weird. If he gives you any trouble, let me know and I’ll kick his ass.” 

Kiara laughs at the image of tiny Sarah Cameron kicking anyone’s ass. Sarah the Debutante street fighting her own brother at Cotillion? Kiara would pay money to see it. 

“There’s my Queen! I was wondering where you went,” Dennis says when the two girls are close enough to hear, and Kiara has to physically restrain herself from rolling her eyes. He wraps his arms around Sarah, and Kiara has to look anywhere but at the two of them. She ends up looking at Kelce, who smiles at her.

“You okay?” Kelce asks, and for a second, Kiara thinks he means about what happened with Rafe. She looks up at him in fear, shocked that he even knew what happened, but he just nods to Sarah. “I was honest about voting for you.”

“Oh,” Kiara breathes out. Of course. He didn’t see anything with Rafe – nothing happened with Rafe. It was just a weird conversation. “Oh, yeah. No, I’m fine. I knew it was coming.”

“Ah, little Carrera, always selling herself short,” Kelce says smirking at her, but his face becomes a little more serious as he continues. “You seriously good? You look a little… spooked.” 

Kiara contemplates telling him what just happened, but she decides against it pretty quickly. Kelce might be nice and respectful and normal, but he’s still Rafe’s best friend. Kiara isn’t sure how far that loyalty reaches, and she doesn’t want to test it. 

“Yeah, yeah.” Kiara says, as she reaches out to take Kelce’s hand and drag him with her onto the dance floor. “Just… nerves from being on stage.”

She silences any more questions with a stunning smile. 

  
  
  


\--------

  
  
  


Kiara’s thankful to be out of her ridiculous dress, even if that means she has to endure a night sitting on Caroline Van der Worker’s floor. Kiara still doesn’t like Caroline – the dinner party fiasco all those months ago feels like a distant dream, but Caroline is still a bitch, and Kiara still doesn’t like her. A night of gossipping in Caroline’s movie room is not Kiara’s favorite thing, but Sarah had begged her to come, so she’s here. 

Caroline invited Kiara with far too much enthusiasm for someone who had hated her earlier in the school year. Now that Kiara’s friends with Sarah, she’s noticed that’s just how it is – everyone’s quick with a compliment or an invitation. It’s not friendship, per se, but it’s some kind of mutual understanding that they won’t start a war with each other. 

It’s still only vaguely tolerable to be around Caroline and Tiffany, but there’s enough people at the sleepover that Kiara thinks she can survive it. She’s seated on the floor between Sarah and Scarlett, wearing a pair of comfy pajama pants. Life could be worse. 

“You and Kelce looked pretty cozy, Kiara,” Scarlett says, glancing sideways at her. Up in the movie room, away from prying parental ears and nosey siblings, the girls are all too eager to discuss relationships and crushes. 

Maybe Kelce and Kiara were pretty close, but Kiara wasn’t really worried about it. She doesn’t know if she and Kelce really are anything at this point, or even if she wants them to be. Kelce was cool tonight, and it was fun to dance and laugh with him. He didn’t even complain about spending the entire night with Dennis and Sarah. He was nice, but Kiara still can’t shake the weird feeling she got from whatever happened with Rafe. Kelce is Rafe’s best friend, and she doesn’t know how to reconcile the nice guy she danced all night with and the best friend of a dirt bag like Rafe. Then again, Rafe _is_ Sarah’s brother; so maybe not everyone around him is as toxic as he is.

“Yeah, I guess,” Kiara humors the girls, smirking a little. 

There’s a chorus of _‘ohhhhh’_ around the circle of girls, and Kiara shrugs. She’s desperate to get the attention off of her and whatever is going on with Kelce. 

“Anyone else got a special someone?” Sarah asks, looking around the circle and wagging her eyebrows. Once the attention is off Kiara, Sarah looks at her and winks. Kiara smiles at her gratefully. 

“Caroline made out with JJ Maybank!” Tiffany yells from the other side of the circle, and Kiara’s train of thought immediately derails. Sarah’s eyes go almost comically wide, but Kiara barely notices. As things are, the only thing Kiara can do is stare at Tiffany and Caroline as the room bursts into chaos. 

If Caroline, or Tiffany, or any girl except Sarah remembers that Kiara was best friends with JJ, they don't show it. It’s fair – Kiara has never exactly broadcasted her affiliation with the Pogues, especially not since she stopped talking to them. Kiara can feel Sarah’s eyes on her, like Sarah’s trying to gauge her reaction. Which is laughable, because Kiara is too shocked to even have a reaction. 

Caroline isn’t paying attention to either of them, too busy blushing furiously as she’s assaulted by questions. It’s unusual behavior for Caroline, who’s always been far from shy about the boys she’s kissing. Kiara wonders if the blush on Caroline’s skin has anything to do with the fact that JJ’s from the Cut, and a familiar sense of protective anger bubbles up inside her at the thought of Caroline being ashamed of her friend. It takes a second for Kiara to remember that she's no longer friends with JJ, and the reminder is agonizing. She forces her heartbeat to quell and pushes it all out of her mind. She had promised Sarah - no moping allowed tonight. 

“It was at the kegger last week,” Caroline admits, and a whole new round of questioning explodes around her like rapid fire. 

Since Sarah and Kiara had brought a few Kooks to the Boneyard, it’s been like the floodgates opened. Every Monday since that party, Kiara’s walked into school and heard stories about the latest gathering at the Boneyard. Now that the Kooks are in, they revel in the little bit of rebellion they get from going to the bad side of the island. It makes Kiara sick, but there’s nothing she can do about it. She knew a lot of the Academy kids were going to the keggers, but she didn’t know Caroline was one of them – nor that she was macking on JJ. She really, really wishes she never knew. 

“Was he good?” Olivia asks, and Caroline groans out loud. She holds her face in her hands, barely nodding her head. Her confirmation sends another wave of chatter around the circle, until even Scarlett gets sucked in the frenzy. 

“Oh my god, how far did you go?” 

Caroline leans back from her seated position so she is lying on the floor. She fully covers her face, and Kiara momentarily feels bad for her – this is the most awkward way to talk about macking on someone. When Caroline doesn’t answer, the girls get more frantic, their voices overlapping with each other.

“You did not! You did not sleep with him!”

Kiara doesn’t know who asks the question, but the words make her stomach drop. Suddenly, Caroline’s bashfulness and her aversion to answering questions makes a lot more sense. 

Kiara’s brain feels like it’s melting. 

“He’s really good at what he does, alright!” Caroline finally yells in confirmation, rolling onto her stomach and hiding her head in her arms while the noise in the room reaches dangerous levels.

It seems like everyone wants more information – the room is a chorus of _‘how’_ and _‘where’_ and _‘I need more details.’_ Kiara doesn’t want any more details, what Kiara needs is to get out of this room. She cannot sit here and listen to Caroline recount her intimate encounter with Jonathan James Maybank in front of all these Kook girls or she’s going to throw up. JJ sleeping with a Kook – and not any Kook, either, freaking _Caroline_. Kiara can’t wrap her head around it. JJ knew about Caroline and the disastrous dinner party, he had seen the immediate aftermath when Kiara showed up at Rixton's Cove. All those months ago, he - and John B and Pope - had held her up in the sand when she couldn't do it herself. This can’t be anything but a personal attack from JJ – especially now, not even a month after their fight at the Boneyard. There’s no way JJ didn’t know who Caroline was, and he had to have known Kiara was going to find out. This feels like a final nail in the coffin of their friendship that Kiara didn’t even know existed. 

“Hey, I’m going to go get more soda. Does anyone want anything?” Sarah says abruptly, standing up from her seat. There’s a chorus of people shouting out drink orders that Sarah mostly ignores. Instead, she looks down at Kiara, who’s still staring at Caroline with a look of horrified astonishment. “Kie, want to help me?”

Kiara snaps out of her trance, nodding at Sarah and standing up, numbly following her to the kitchen. 

“That was... wild,” Sarah comments as they descend the stairs. “Are you okay?”

Kiara really doesn’t know how she feels. Mostly, she feels sick to her stomach thinking about Caroline and JJ like _that._ She doesn’t know why she’s this shaken by the news, she doesn’t even know how much she should read into it, or if she should read into it at all. Mostly, she just wants to pour bleach in her ears to rid her mind of the image that has been placed there, seared forever in horrifying detail.

“Yeah,” Kiara answers after a second, without any true feeling behind the word. “I mean, wow. I didn’t see _that_ coming.”

“Jesus, neither did I.” Sarah opens up the freezer, pushing items around until she produces a pint of ice cream. 

“What about the sodas?” Kiara asks, motioning vaguely to the stairs they had just come down. Sarah shrugs, digging around the silverware drawer until she produces two spoons. 

“They can wait a minute. Let them get it out of their systems.” She offers Kiara a spoon, and Kiara accepts gratefully. Honestly, in the last three weeks, Kiara and Sarah sharing a pint of ice cream has become all too common an occurrence.

“Like, this is weird, right? I’m not overreacting, right?” Kiara says, leaning on the edge of the counter and poking her spoon into the ice cream. Her head feels like someone put it in the washing machine on the most violent setting – she can’t make sense of anything. 

“No, of course not. It must be hard to hear about JJ like that, after everything,” Sarah says carefully, looking at Kiara out of the corner of her eyes. 

Kiara swallows thickly. “It’s… weird. He wasn’t like that before, obviously, because we were in middle school. I don’t know, lately, sometimes I feel like... Like I never knew them, you know? Like JJ? Going for _Caroline?”_

Sarah looks at her sympathetically, scooping out a chunk of ice cream for herself. “It’s definitely… out of character for him,” she offers, and Kiara shrugs. 

“Is it, though?” Kiara says, twirling her spoon around in her hand. “That's what I’m saying, I’m not sure I even know what’s in character for him anymore.”

“I mean… “ Sarah starts, and then she bites her lip like she’s choosing her next words carefully. “Objectively speaking, he just slept with some girl. I mean, that isn’t _exactly_ a character-shattering development.” 

Kiara groans, shaking her head. “No, it’s not that. It’s the principle of the thing. He slept with Caroline, like, two weeks after we got in a fight. There’s no way that’s a coincidence.” 

Sarah mulls it over, eventually shrugging a shoulder. “Men are worthless,” she states with an air of finality, and Kiara actually laughs a little. “Besides, you have me.” 

Sarah’s right – Kiara does have her, and what a blessing that is. Before Sarah, Kiara never really had any close female friends. She’s still not completely used to this new dynamic, but there’s so many things that Kiara loves about it. Being friends with Sarah is a whole new experience, and so different from what she had with the Pogues. Unlike the boys, Sarah is a person Kiara can realistically be friends with for the rest of her life. She can envision it so clearly in her head. Sarah and Kiara are going to go through High School together, and then, eventually, they can go to college together. They can be roommates, and rush the same sorority, and take over the environmental club at their College like they took over the environmental club in High School. They’ll be each other’s bridesmaids, and they can have kids at the same time that will grow up to be best friends, just like the two of them. Even as a Freshman in High School, Kiara can see a future where her and Sarah are as close as ever, and it brings Kiara a sense of stability that she’s never had before. 

“Thank god,” Kiara says, as Sarah wrestles the ice cream container out of her arms.

“Thank god,” Sarah responds, smiling brightly at her. 

“We should probably go upstairs before they come looking for us,” Sarah adds after a second, and Kiara obliges. As much as she wants to avoid any and all discussion of Caroline at the Boneyard, she also doesn’t want to be found wallowing in her own self pity with a pint of stolen Cookie Dough ice cream. 

“Do you remember what sodas we needed to get?” Kiara asks as Sarah starts pulling out random cans from the fridge. 

“Fuck no,” Sarah says, a mischievous smile on her face. “They’ll have to deal with what we bring them.”

Kiara laughs, reaching out to take half the load, and she’s once again filled with immense gratitude that someone like Sarah Cameron exists. 

“Also,” Sarah continues, pulling the last of the sodas out of the fridge before closing it with her hip. “If you want me to tell them to stop talking about it, I will. Just say the word.” 

“No, it’s alright,” Kiara lies through her teeth, turning to head back upstairs. “It’s fine. I’ll be fine.”

Kiara doesn’t know who she’s trying to convince.

  
  
  
  


\----------

  
  


“Hey, Kels!” Rafe yells. Kelce is a few yards away from Rafe, headed towards Topper’s house. Even a few hundred feet from the house, Rafe can feel the bass of the music in the ground. He knows this is going to be a great party. 

“Hey man, what’s up?” Kelce says, turning around in greeting. Behind Kelce, the party lights are calling them, but there’s something Rafe’s got to take care of first.

“Not much, man, not much,” Rafe says, putting his arm around Kelce. “I, uh, saw you were with Kiara a lot of tonight.” 

“Well, yeah,” Kelce says, confused. Rafe spins them around, pulling Kelce along towards Topper’s house. “She was my date.” 

“Yeah, yeah, of course, man.” Rafe desperately tries to keep his thoughts in order – one of the Seniors brought some of the _really strong_ stuff to the dance, and he still can’t really see straight. “I just wanted to let you know, I think you should stay away from her.”

“Bro, fuck off,” Kelce reacts immediately, throwing Rafe’s arm from around his shoulders. 

“No, I’m serious, man. She’s bad news,” Rafe says earnestly, and Kelce just rolls his eyes.

“Kiara Carrera is bad news? Your own sister’s best friend?” Kelce dismisses Rafe with a wave of his hand. “Get out of here.”

“I’m serious, man. She, like, totally came onto me at the dance,” Rafe says, throwing his hands up in surrender. “I told her, ya know, I can’t do that to my man. My best friend.”

“When did this happen? I was literally with her the whole time,” Kelce says, crossing his arms and staring at Rafe.

“After Sarah got crowned, ya know. While they were doing the fucking dance thing.” Kelce doesn’t say anything, he just stares at Rafe, conflicted. Even though he’s silent, Rafe can tell he got through to him, and that’s all Rafe needs. “I just thought I’d tell you, man. You know I look out for my boys.”

“Yeah,” Kelce says, looking at Rafe suspiciously. “Yeah, you do.” 

“Hell yeah, man.” Rafe places his arm around Kelce’s shoulders again. “This just means we need to find you a super hot girl to take your mind off of Kiara…”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annnnd the next chapter is going to be: "How Do You Deal With The Sad Feels? (Answer: Poorly)"


	14. How Do You Deal With The Sad Feels? (Answer: Poorly)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello And Welcome To: Annie’s Self Deprecation Hour, also known as Chapter 14’s Authors Note
> 
> Can we all give my lovely, patient, wonderful, completely overworked and severely underpaid beta reader a round of applause for this chapter? One of the files created during this editing session was entitled “Chapter 14 is a fucking disaster”, if that tells you anything. I am very, very, very thankful for lemon_drizzle_cake’s seemingly endless supply of knowledge and patience when I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing. This chapter is only readable because of her. 
> 
> I'm going to leave it at this: obviously, I Went Through It with this chapter.
> 
> (also, please ignore the fact that the first third of this chapter was originally from chapter 11)

“Bird, you around?” 

It’s unusually quiet in the Chateau as Big John opens the door to his study. He peeks his head around, searching for his son in the clutter of the tiny house. He’s fairly certain John B hadn’t left the house, though he can never be 100% sure. Call it terrible parenting or what not, but John B would come and go with his friends like the wind. Big John had long since stopped trying to keep tabs on the kid.

“Yeah, I’m over here,” says John B’s voice from the living room. His head pops up from where he’s laying on the sofa so Big John can see him. 

“Is JJ around?” Big John asks, scanning the room for the ever-present ball of energy that is the Maybank kid. John B shakes his head as he lays back down on the couch, turning his attention back to his cell phone. 

“Nah, he’s got a job up on Figure Eight.” 

“What about - uh - Pope?” Big John says, stuttering over his words. He’s so used to his son’s quartet that he still has trouble leaving the fourth member out of his questioning – he made the mistake of mentioning Kiara a few weeks ago, and John B was in a sour mood for the rest of the day. Big John doesn’t really know what happened between the four of them, just that the boys are now a full time trio and Kiara hasn’t been around in months. He hadn’t asked, and John B hadn’t offered any information. Big John still trips up sometimes.

”Uh, no, he isn’t here either,” John B says, leaning up on his elbows and looking at his dad. He quirks an eyebrow at him. “What’s up?” 

Big John sighs as he moves around the kitchen table, repositioning one of the chairs so he can sit and face the couch. He doesn’t know how to start this conversation with John B. No one has ever accused him of being a great communicator, and the level of secrecy he wants to maintain with his current situation only makes him that much less competent. He clasps his hands in front of him as he sits down, and stares at them for a second before addressing John B again.

“Bird, I think I found something.” 

John B sits up at his words, his phone forgotten and his full attention directed at his father. Big John had never told John B he found anything – he was always recklessly honest with the kid, and when his searches turned up nothing, John B knew as much. It’s not like Big John to speak without certainty, and that’s what catches John B’s attention.

“Like, with the Merchant?” John B asks, scooting forward on the couch so he’s literally sitting on the edge of his seat.

“Your Uncle T is going to come stay for a while,” Big John brushes off the question and moves on with his spiel. It’s silent for a second, as John B is too shocked to respond to Big John’s words. “I might have to vanish for a bit.”

“What the fuck does that mean?” 

“Watch your mouth,” Big John says, though there’s little force behind his words. “It means exactly what I said it means.”

“But _why_?” John B says, panic entering his voice, and Big John avoids making eye contact with him. Big John runs his fingers through his hair as John B continues. “You go out on the water all the time. You left me alone for, like, four days before. Why does Uncle T have to come up now?”

“He wanted to visit,” Big John says, but it sounds lame even to his ears. Uncle T has rarely come to visit.

“Bullshit,” John B mutters, and Big John looks at him sharply.

“Watch your mouth,” he reminds him again. 

John B stands up from the couch. “Dad, stop avoiding the question!” 

“I’m not avoiding the question.” Where John B’s voice is panicked, Big John struggles to remain calm – it’s not an easy feat, with the stress he’s under and the way John B is acting.

“Then stop lying to me!” 

“I’m not lying to you!” Big John roars, losing his cool just slightly. He takes a deep breath and starts to speak again, forcing himself to keep a calmer tone. “Uncle T is coming to stay with you, I’m going out on the water. I might not be back for a while. That’s all you need to know.”

“That’s such bullshit. You can’t just disappear!” John B says, storming past his dad to the safe they keep on the kitchen counter. “And I know you took the rent money out of here last week. What are we going to do without that, huh? Is that part of your disappearing act too?”

Big John sighs again – hopefully, by next week, John B will never have to worry about things like rent money ever again. It’s the only thing getting Big John through this conversation, and the stress of the end of the search. The pressure from Ward, the feeling of impending doom, the sleepless nights and hours spent planning – it’ll be worth it when John B and JJ can wake up in a nice house that never runs out of food or hot water. It’ll be a few weeks of hell, and then it’ll all be worth it.

Big John chants this in his head as he turns to face John B. “I took some money out of there to cover some costs - “

“For the fucking Royal Merchant!” John B screams, throwing the box off the counter.

“I said watch your mouth!” Big John yells, standing up from his seat fast enough to send the chair flying. 

Truth be told, John B isn’t far off. The more Big John looks into Ward Cameron, the less he trusts him. There’s a long line of business partners and developers who have been fucked over by Ward for less money, and Big John is not about to get made a fool. He took the rent money as payment for a lawyer – a good contract lawyer, who can draft a fool-proof agreement for the partnership between Big John and Ward. He’ll find the gold tomorrow, or it’ll be on Tanny Hill’s property. Either way, he’ll need a contract and a lawyer. Mainland lawyers aren’t cheap – once he gets Ward to agree to a 20-80 split, he’ll have a lawyer draft the contract and he’ll be able to breathe a little easier. 

“You’re never going to find it,” John B says, his voice quieter but filled with venom. “You’re never going to find it, and you’re going to waste all our money, all the money I worked for. People have been looking for the gold for 100 years. If it was out there to be found, it would have already been found.”

Big John shakes his head. He can’t play into John B’s anger. “I’ll be back soon,” he says instead. 

“You’re crazy! You’ve lost it. You’re going to risk our house so you can – what? What are you going to do? Go on another deep sea dive? ‘Cause all the others worked out so well!” John B yells as he starts pacing in front of the kitchen. 

“Bird - “

“You are so obsessed with finding this gold, you don’t even see that it’s ruined your life. You have this insane idea that you’re going to be rich and famous and then, what? Mom comes back? You’ve got to move on, Dad! You will never find it!”

“Look here, son - “

“You’re a shit father.” 

John B pushes past him and slams his way out of the Chateau. Big John can see his retreating figure head towards the HMS Pogue, and he lets out a deep breath.

Big John takes a deep breath, trying to calm his blood pressure. He’s not angry with John B, and he understands his reaction. The fight only got heated because John B is scared and doesn’t know what’s going on. Big John recognizes that is his fault, and he’s fully ready to take the blame. Big John also knows that if John B knew how close he was to finding the gold, he’d be singing a different tune. 

It doesn’t change the fact that John B can’t know too much about the current operation. Ward Cameron is a shady businessman, and there have been some convenient disappearances around him. At a few opportune times in his career, Ward Cameron’s business partner have gone missing, or ended up in a car accident, or otherwise incapacitated. It hasn’t happened often enough to warrant concern from a casual observer, but Big John can sense a pattern when he sees one. He’s not going to accuse Ward of anything – he has no proof, just a wild theory – but that doesn’t mean he won’t take precautions. If Ward is really willing to get rid of the competition in any form necessary, Big John is going to accept that risk for himself. He will not accept that risk for John B, though. The less John B knows, the safer he’ll be if Ward is truly capable of what Big John thinks he’s capable of. If being called a _‘shit father’_ is the price he has to pay to keep his boy safe, then he’s more than happy to pay it.

That being said, Big John needs a back up plan. If things really do go south with Ward, he needs a way to get John B the most recent findings in his research before Ward can figure it out. If someone is going to find this gold, Big John is going to be damn certain it’s a Routledge. 

He stands up from the table, watching as John B whips the Pogue away from the dock and through the marsh. He turns away as he loses sight of John B, heading to his study. He shuffles through a couple boxes until he finds an old tape recorder he used to use in interviews he conducted to learn more about the wreck. He spends a few minutes fiddling with it, erasing all the previous recordings. 

A map and a gun are sitting on his desk. The map is to show John B where to go looking, and the gun is for protection, in case Ward decides Big John is a liability. Big John’s never used the gun before, and it’s spent the last five years sitting unloaded in his office. If there was ever a time to pull out an old firearm, Big John thinks it might be now.

It took a few more weeks than Big John had thought to get all the equipment for the last expedition – the underwater camera was on backorder for over a month. Now that he has almost everything ready, there are still some things he needs to take care of. In a couple of hours, he’ll drop a package in Olivia Redfield’s mausoleum. Tomorrow, he’ll be on a boat out to the last place he has to look. For now, he’s going to record a message for his son, in case all his worst fears come true. 

Maybe Big John can sense it in the air, or feel it in his gut. Maybe he shouldn’t ignore the sense of foreboding, the apprehension that something could go very, very wrong in an incredibly short amount of time. He hopes that whatever he’s feeling is wrong – he hopes that he’s just nervous, or overcautious. Being this close to the treasure is exhilarating, but it’s overshadowed by the fear of a darker reality. As Big John sits down to record a message he hopes John B never hears, he tries to shake the feeling that this journey is going to end in disaster. 

  
  


\---------

  
  
  


It feels like the entire world is collapsing in on John B. 

Last September, his life was far from perfect, but he had carved out a little space for himself and his friends. Maybe he didn’t have a lot, but he loved what he had. A dad he almost got along with, a boat he had free reign over, and a set of best friends he could always rely on – what more could a guy ask for? 

As the days roll closer and closer to May, John B feels like everything he once held sacred is losing it’s worth. 

It started when Kiara left in November – months without communication ruined their friendship and any trust John B had in the girl. He had seen her around, playing Kook Princess with _Sarah Cameron_ of all people. Now, Kiara’s a stranger to John B, a foreign entity that he couldn’t recognize for the life of him. Even if John B wanted to, he couldn’t walk up to Kiara and start a conversation. He’s pretty sure she’d respond in a different language, and John B is not bilingual. 

Even without Kiara, the Pogues were doing fine for a little while. Maybe _‘fine’_ isn’t the right word – they were doing okay. It wasn’t the same, by far, but it was an acceptable kind of different. They still saw each other everyday, and although they had to avoid any discussion of Kiara, they managed to survive.

Then, Kiara had the audacity to show up at the Boneyard with the Kooks. 

John B hadn’t really expected to get into a fight with Kiara when she showed up. When he agreed with JJ to let her come to the Boneyard, John B had meant to try and work it out. He was going to hear her out, or at least act civilly. JJ wanted it, and as much as John B hated to admit it, so did he – Kiara had been a part of every one of his favorite memories since middle school. Losing her wasn’t easy, and he didn’t want to continue down this path if there was a way to avoid it. He could hold his tongue for one night if it meant things would go back to the way they were. 

Of course that wasn’t what happened. Kiara showed up, Sarah and Rafe and Topper trailing behind her. John B saw red as soon as he spotted them, and his anger didn’t truly quell until the next morning. And rightly so, if you ask him. This was the same Rafe who had beat up him and JJ, landing them in all that trouble with the police. What was Kiara even doing, hanging out with him and his bunch of losers? Topper had been an asshole to Kiara when she started at the Academy, and Sarah Cameron was so vapidly shallow that John B couldn’t even picture her and Kiara having a conversation. 

As soon as Kiara sat down with her little posse of Kooks, John B knew exactly what she was doing. Whatever she had said to JJ at the Wreck, whatever they had talked about – John B knew she had no intention of ever apologizing or coming back to them. She was there to make it clear exactly where she stood - she stood on the side of the Kooks, and she wanted to remind the boys of that fact. Part of John B wondered if she wasn’t doing this to torture them. It was an awful reminder of their place on the food chain of the island. 

So he lashed out at her. Said some things he didn’t believe, and some things he did. Pope got in there too, made some good points, and some others that kind of took John B’s breath away. Kiara put the nail in the coffin, and then she left, and John B would be happy to never see her again. 

Before the Boneyard, Kiara had been an occasional point of contention between JJ and Pope. JJ, loyal to a fault, was certain she was coming back, while Pope was adamant she was a traitor. Pope never wanted to even mention the existence of Kiara, while JJ was always trying to find a way to reach out to her. John B stayed mostly in the middle, trying to keep the peace by avoiding the conversation altogether.

After that night, the situation did a complete 180. JJ didn’t mention Kiara anymore, not even in passing – it became taboo to even speak her name. Pope, on the other hand, all of the sudden was bringing her up more and more – as if her outright betrayal at the beach had vindicated his anger. It started with Pope making a comment or two about Kiara that led to a full-blown argument with JJ. A few times in the last months, those arguments had devolved into fist fights.

Seeing them fighting like dogs leaves a sour taste in John B’s mouth. Even though JJ is a little hotheaded, he’s never had a short temper with John B or Pope. John B is used to running into battle to help JJ with a fight, not pulling him out of one. And while Pope’s not exactly a pacifist, he doesn’t usually tend towards violence. When they start throwing punches, John B has no idea how to react. 

It’s not like it’s happening very often – one of them will snap every once in a while, when the tensions in the group are running particularly high. The problem is, John B can feel the tensions rising by the day, and he doesn’t know how long this tentative peace will last. 

That’s not to say that the boys aren’t friends anymore – in fact, most of the time, things are almost completely normal. They still hang out at the Chateau most days, and they roll up to the Boneyard together on the weekends. John B and JJ got front row seats to Pope’s upcoming performance in _West Side Story,_ and Pope has a standing invitation to all of their track meets. On the surface, nothing has changed.

It’s what simmers below the surface that John B’s worried about. It seems like everytime JJ and Pope fight, they slip just a little further away from each other and, by extension, from John B. Pope has been disappearing more and more often, an excuse always ready – he’ll miss a couple days out on the boat, blaming homework or rehearsals or chores for his dad. A year ago, John B could have counted on Pope being at the Chateau any day of the week. Now, he’s slipping away more often than not, blaming some responsibility that didn’t exist a month ago. 

JJ has started hanging around with his cousins, occasionally opting out of their usual boating trips and bonfires. And it’s not like JJ spending time with his family is a bad thing, it clearly isn’t. And it wouldn’t worry John B at all if it didn’t coincide with Pope’s increasing absences. 

And if it wasn’t coinciding with a growing number of nights without JJ on the pull out couch. JJ used to be a mainstay in the Chateau, as much a part of the home as John B or Big John. In the last few weeks, JJ’s all of a sudden become particular about spending the night at his dad’s house. Never, in all their years of friendship, has John B been invited into that house, but he still knows what goes on behind closed doors. His hatred for Luke Maybank is so strong it’s physically painful, and he always sleeps better when he knows JJ is safe at the Chateau. If JJ is choosing to spend more time at his own house… well, John B can’t help but think that something must be really wrong. 

All of this – the sudden flakiness of his two best friends, the quick fists between them, JJ’s reacquaintance with his own house – reminds John B of the terrible feeling he got when Kiara started to slip away. He feels crazy, because the boys aren’t doing anything wrong. Objectively, there’s nothing out of the ordinary. John B doesn’t know if he’s paranoid since losing Kiara, or if he’s reading too much into Pope and JJ’s sudden unreliability, but he can feel that something is happening, and he doesn’t know how to fix it. John B can’t even bring himself to ask the boys if somethings going on, because it sounds crazy even in his own head. 

Now, on top of his friends acting weird, his dad is also being all ominous about _‘needing to disappear for a while’_. Big John has vanished on John B before – days at sea without contact, weeks were John B would only see him in passing as he comes and goes through the Chateau, or when the only contact John B would have with him would be waking up to the sound of Big John leaving the house before the sun rose. It’s not like vanishing dads are an anomaly on the island, but the way Big John had said it, like he was giving John B a warning, tied John B’s stomach up in knots. Something about the conversation made this disappearance feel much more permanent.

First Kiara leaves, and then John B feels like he’s losing Pope and JJ slowly but surely, and now his dad is trying to pull some Houdini shit on him. John B doesn’t know how he pissed off the god of Close And Meaningful Relationships, but they are certainly a vengeful deity. 

John B has nowhere to go – he can’t go back to the Chateau, and both JJ and Pope had cancelled on him today. Lord knows where they are, or if they’d show up if John B sent out an emergency Pogue meeting alert. John B isn’t sure he wants to know the answer. 

Instead of finding either of them, John B takes the little HMS Pogue, which sometimes feels like the only remaining testament to what his life was like a year ago, and putters out onto the marsh. Eventually, he cuts the engine, lays down on the dock, and stares at the sky as the ocean gently rocks the boat. 

Even after hours of thinking, he can’t come up with a way to fix everything. 

  
  


\----------

  
  


“You’re so fucking pressed, dude,” JJ says, tossing a rock out into the water as they both approach the firelight. Now that the weather’s warmer, as the calendar slowly etches towards summer, the Boneyard is busier than ever. “We need to find you a touron.” 

“A touron is going to help me when my dad is disappearing on me?” John B asks incredulously. He had caught up to JJ a few minutes before they got to the party and relayed the weird conversation with his dad from earlier in the week. JJ, whose outlook on parents has been permanently damaged, didn’t seem fazed. 

“Maybe, man,” JJ says, smiling deviously. 

It’s times like these when John B truly feels like he’s going crazy. JJ’s a brother to John B, whether or not he sleeps on the pull out couch in the Chateau. A rocky patch in their relationship, losing Kiara and the ensuing fights, whatever unresolved anger is there – it all pales in comparison to the years of friendship they have built up. John B would die for JJ in a heartbeat, and he knows JJ feels the same way. John B is almost completely convinced that the growing rift between him, JJ, and Pope is a figment of his imagination. 

“Look, your dad is always disappearing,” JJ says when John doesn’t respond. “He was gone for, what, a week last month? He’s probably going to try and be a good dad and give you a heads up or some shit.” 

“Yeah, cause John Routledge is father of the year,” John B says, rolling his eyes. 

“Could have it worse,” JJ shrugs, and John B has to force himself not to visibly react to that statement. JJ tone isn’t rude – in fact, John B is pretty sure JJ isn’t even talking about himself. Despite their intent, the words remind John B that JJ really does have it worse. JJ’s been showing up to school with new bruises that are far too easily explained away, and John B knows _exactly_ what that means. He’d sell his soul to give Luke a taste of his own medicine. 

He can’t do that, though. John B may be getting stronger, but Luke is a fully grown man with a temper the entire island is scared of. The only way he can protect JJ now is the same way he’s always protected him. 

“You want to stay over for a couple nights?” John B asks awkwardly. He hasn’t asked JJ to stay over at his house since the fourth grade. JJ has just always been around, no invitation needed. John B doesn’t even know how to frame the question when the Chateau feels like it belongs to JJ as much as it belongs to John B. “You know, with Dad out of town…” he trails off. 

“What, JB, you can’t sleep alone?” JJ teases, but John B knows from his demeanor that the invitation is already accepted. 

“Fuck off,” John B says, but his tone isn’t as teasing as he wanted it to be. JJ looks at him for a second. 

“Wow, you’re really bent out of shape about this,” JJ comments, and John B throws his hands up in the air.

“It just feels different this time, I don’t know.” John B lets out a sigh, and JJ silently contemplates him for another second. 

“Yeah, alright bud. I guess if you need a little muscle to protect the grand ole Chateau, I could probably make it work with my schedule,” JJ says, flexing his bicep under the cut off sleeves of his t-shirt. 

John B's entire demeanor softens a little at JJ’s words. “Yeah, I’ll be forever grateful,” he scoffs, but he actually means it.

Pope nods to them as they approach the keg. “There’s some Kooks here,” He nods with his head towards the group of Academy kids standing on the other side of the fire. 

“You mean - “ JJ says, tensing up immediately, but Pope cuts him off. 

“Not her,” Pope says, his tone making it all too clear who he is talking about. There’s a special, terrible type of silence around the boys after they almost mention Kiara, and it hangs in the air for a second before John B tries to dispel it. 

“You know, you don’t have to announce that the Kooks are here. There’s been Kooks at every party recently.” 

It’s true – the Boneyard parties have been slowly filling with Kooks since Kiara had made her infamous appearance. Even though she hadn’t bothered to show up again, her friends certainly did. 

“Just because they are here doesn’t mean I have to like it,” Pope says, turning back to the fire.

“Well, they’re good for one thing,” JJ says, winking at a Kook girl who’s walking up to the keg. 

John B and Pope look at each other, and then Pope rolls his eyes as John B drags him away from the keg. They’ve learned to give JJ enough room when he’s flirting with a girl.

It started a few weeks after Kiara stopped responding. JJ disappeared with a random Touron. When he showed up again, an hour or so later, he kind of looked like he reached Nirvana. The girl, on the other hand, had looked significantly less pleased. John B hadn’t meant anything more that a joke when he told JJ as much, but since then it seems JJ’s made it his personal mission to become as good at sex as he is bad at everything else. 

Even though John B hadn’t meant to start a challenge with JJ, that didn’t mean he was going to back down from it. It happened kind of by accident, when John B met a touron from Cincinnati some weeks later. Her name was Aubrey, she was visiting with her parents over the winter to do some maintenance on their condo, and she had snuck away for a few hours for the party. Within minutes of showing up, she asked John B, as bluntly as possible, if he wanted to have sex. John B, a 15 year old with crazy hormones and an ongoing bet with his best friend, had enthusiastically said yes. It was an insane 25 seconds, but John B didn’t feel so great afterwards. It was awkward, and he was self-conscious after it all died down. He freaked out when Aubrey went to the bathroom, threw on his clothes, and beelined it for the Chateau. Pope and JJ found him throwing back shots of vodka on the hammock later that night, and he paid the price for it dearly when he acquainted himself with the Chateau’s toilet bowl. Months later, the entire thing still makes John B feel kind of dirty, but his subsequent sexual encounters have been significantly less traumatic. 

Pope still thinks the two of them are complete idiots. He had tried to talk to them about teen pregnancy, or STDs, or any other number of terrible things that could occur, but neither boy listened to him. Eventually, Pope stopped lecturing them about casual sex. Now, Pope has resigned himself to muttering _‘wrap it if you tap it’_ every time they’re in the near vicinity of a girl _._ JJ thinks it's hilarious. 

“ _John B!_ ” A voice shouts from across the fire, and John B looks up to see Peeler approaching them. 

“Peeler!” John B shouts back before hugging her. Peeler’s a distant cousin of JJ’s – a second cousin once removed or something like that. She’s a year younger than the Pogues, still in middle school, but somehow she manages to get into the Boneyard parties with no problem.

“Where’s J?” Peeler asks when she reaches them, and John B gestures over his shoulder to the keg where JJ is charming his Kook conquest. 

“Oh, god,” Peeler says, peering over to where John B is pointing. Her face contorts in disgusted. “Has Pope told him about teenage pregnancy yet?”

“No, actually, JJ still thinks babies come from storks,” John B says, smiling as Pope shakes his head.

“Teen pregnancy is a serious problem,” he says under his breath. 

“Whatever, Einstein,” Peeler says, shoving Pope good naturedly. 

In the months since Kiara left, there has been a small stream of people that the Pogues have entertained to fill the spot Kiara had left. It hasn’t exactly worked so far, but Peeler’s about as close as they got. Peeler’s a little odd – her name is _Peeler,_ after all, and she’s younger than them – but she fits right into the banter the three of them have. She doesn’t quite fill the gap, but she brings a different vibe to the Pogues that releases a lot of the tension that’s been building up between the three of them lately. It’s a nice change. 

“Who is he even talking to?” Peeler says, gesturing to JJ’s friend by the keg. 

“Some Kook,” Pope replies, and Peeler grimaces. 

John B, for the most part, stays away from Kooks. He’s certainly not above disappearing with a touron for a few hours if they’re vibing, but he wouldn’t dare start anything with one of the Figure Eight girls. Even though his rendezvous with tourons are less common than he might have hoped for, he’s never desperate enough to stoop that low. 

In truth, JJ doesn’t hook up with people all that often, either – just more often than John B or Pope do. Unlike John B, JJ doesn’t have any qualms about inviting a Kook back to the Chateau for the night. JJ doesn’t even technically go after Kook girls – it’s the Kook girls that throw themselves at him. Still, it’s one of JJ’s less dangerous pastimes, so Pope and John B try not to comment on it too much. As long as everything stays safe and consensual, neither of them truly care what JJ does. 

Even though JJ only pulled a few tourons and even fewer Kooks, rumors spread like wildfire about him. Something about JJ’s charms and good looks, his bad-boy reputation coupled with a general respect for girls, made him a regular star of the Boneyard. While John B and Pope would never really shame JJ for his sex life, they do love to poke fun at the revolving door of girls that seem to show up whenever JJ is at the Boneyard, fighting for his attention. 

JJ thrives in the limelight. 

“Who’d she come with?” Peeler asks, referring to the girl JJ’s talking to. 

“The regular crew – Preston, Max, some Academy football players, a couple of the Princesses,” Pope says, nodding over to where the Kook boys are standing. 

“Hey, yo!” JJ says, approaching the three of them with his current Kook girlfriend in tow. “Olivia here has challenged me to a shotgunning contest, and I need a couple officiators.”

\---------

“I won!” Olivia yells, throwing the beer can down in the sand. JJ waits a couple seconds, and then throws his own beer can next to hers. He plays it up a little, letting his face fall into shock. He tries to pretend he wasn’t done with his beer a while ago already – Olivia seems like a girl who likes to win. 

“Alright, alright,” JJ says, holding his hand up so Olivia will high five him. When she does, he clasps his fingers around hers. “This is embarrassing.”

“Why, because you’re getting beaten by a girl?” Olivia says, a smirk playing on her lips. 

“No,” JJ says, laughing. “Because I’m getting beaten by a Kook.”

Olivia gasps like she’s offended, but her eyes light up. “Who are you calling a Kook?” 

JJ smirks at her, raising an eyebrow at her in response. Olivia breathes out a laugh, crossing her arms over her chest, and JJ can already tell that she might say yes if he asks her to head back to the Chateau with him _right now_.

 _“Olivia!”_ a girl from across the party yells, starting to stomp over to where JJ and her are standing. 

“Oh my god,” Olivia says, uncrossing her arms and frowning. “If you give me one second, I just have to deal with her.”

JJ just nods, waving at Olivia as he heads back to his own pod of friends. John B, Pope, and Peeler are standing in a semi-circle, out of the normal foot traffic around the fire. Pope and John B are both staring at JJ like he has two heads, while Peeler just looks peeved.

“Dude,” John B says once JJ is in front of him. “What the fuck?” 

“I’ve seen you shotgun three beers in that same amount of time,” Pope says, gesturing to the sand where the two empty cans still lay. 

“Yeah, well,” JJ says, turning back towards Olivia. She’s gesturing wildly to her friend, but JJ manages to catch her eye. She looks away, suddenly bashful, and JJ smirks. “That’s not what I’m going for.”

“Not what you’re – oh,” John B says, suddenly understanding. “Oh, okay. Sly dog, aren’t you?”

“I try,” JJ says, smirking at John B’s awestruck expression. 

“Y’all are disgusting,” Peeler says, turning away from the three boys and looking down the beach. 

“Peeler, you already know throwing the contest is going to -”

“Peeler! What the fuck?” A voice shouts from down the beach, and the four of them turn towards the sound. “What the fuck are you doing – oh, Jesus. Hey, JJ. Y’all gave me a heart attack, I thought my sister was hanging around a couple lowlifes at the Boneyard.”

The voice belongs to Peeler’s older brother Charlie, a gruff kid a couple of years out of high school. He had tried going to community college, but he dropped out of school after a semester and filled his time with slightly less legal enterprises in order to pay the bills.

“Your sister _is_ hanging around a bunch of lowlifes at the Boneyard,” JJ says smiling, reaching out to clap Charlie on the back. 

“Hey John B, hey Pope,” Charlie nods at the two boys. “You taking good care of the little one over here?”

“Stop calling me that,” Peeler pouts, reaching over to shove both Charlie and JJ – making them both laugh at her posturing. 

A couple months ago, John B and Pope hardly knew who Charlie and Peeler were. Everyone knew that the Maybank family tree spread over the island like weeds, but Charlie, Peeler, and JJ had hardly ever interacted – their respective branches of the clan estranged for one reason or another. Once JJ became a fixture at the Boneyard, he started bumping into Charlie more and more often. Eventually, they got to talking, and then JJ started hanging out at Charlie’s house occasionally. JJ realized he got along well with Peeler, too, and after that, Peeler and Charlie had been a recurring theme for the Pogues. 

“You guys want anything?” Charlie asks, pulling a little baggy of marjuana out of his pocket. It’s not the first time he’s asked – Charlie loves giving out the friends and family discount – but none of the boys have taken him up on his offer as of yet. 

It’s not like JJ doesn’t want to try smoking, but he absolutely doesn’t want to try smoking alone, and he’s pretty certain Pope would have a conniption if JJ agreed. 

“I mean…” John B trails off, looking at JJ. JJ quirks an eyebrow up at him, silently asking if he’s serious. John B shrugs his shoulders, replies with a _“maybe”_ that feels like forced nonchalance.

“Yeah,” JJ says after a second, turning to look back at Charlie. Charlie’s eyebrows shoot up to his hairline when JJ agrees. “Yeah, what do you have?” 

“Ah, just the Cripple today. Probably not good for a first time smoker but, hey, you’ve got that good old Maybank blood in ya. You could probably handle it,” Charlie says, his face breaking out into a smile. 

JJ looks at John B, doublechecking one last time.. “Yeah?” he asks.

“No!” Pope yells, characteristically blowing a gasket at the proposition. Pope looks frantically between JJ and John B, his facial expression making it clear that he thinks they are both insane. “No, stop, this is a bad idea.” 

“Yeah,” John B answers after a second, and JJ ignores Pope’s worries as he turns towards his cousin.

“How much do I owe you?” JJ says, even though he already knows the answer.

“Oh boy, J, we’re not charging family on this side of the island. Here, let me show you how to roll…”

\---------

  
  


“JJ, for the love of god, there are not any snakes in the trees!” Pope yells, trying to get JJ to sit down. He had read a lot about marjuana, and he knew paranoia could be a side effect, but he didn’t think it would be quite so infuriating. 

Pope’s a planner and a researcher. He had done his due diligence because he knew that, at some point, the boys would probably try it, and Pope wanted to be prepared. He just didn’t think the night would be tonight, and he didn’t think it’d be like herding fucking cats. 

John B’s laying down on a log away from the fire, staring at the stars and occasionally murmuring something that sounds like _“space rabbits”._ He’s been mostly chill since they finished the joint, and he only almost fell into the fire once. So far, Pope’s giving John B an A+ for Surviving His First Drug Experience. 

If Pope sticks with the grading theme, then JJ is currently batting a solid C+ for survival skills. He’s standing up, pointing towards the trees around the beach, yelling about snakes that are out to get him. Pope’s also pretty sure JJ’s trying to fall into the fire, given the amount of times Pope has had to save him. 

“I swear to god, man, the snakes are right there,” JJ says, pointing up at the trees and flinching away from them, as if the imaginary snakes are going to reach out and bite him. Pope wants a venomous snake to come out of the trees and bite _him_ to put him out of this misery. He never should have agreed to care for these two idiots while they were intoxicated. The Debate Club had offered to host a movie night, and Pope could have been watching a movie and eating popcorn instead of being covered in beer and the smell of marjuana, trying to wrangle two hooligans back to the Chateau in one piece.

“What’s wrong with him?” The Kook girl – Olivia – asks, her voice like nails on a chalkboard. It took a little time for the high to kick in for JJ, and at first it was fun – him and Olivia were laughing about everything, and JJ was singing along to all the songs on the radio. Then, once the real high kicked in, JJ’s demeanor changed, and he started yelling at invisible creatures _._ At around that same time, John B went borderline cataonic, and Olivia had taken to standing next to Pope, offering unhelpful advice and stupid questions. 

“He’s high,” Pope says, his voice short. He wants to add _dumbass_ at the end, but he’s pretty sure Olivia wouldn’t appreciate that. “It’s making him paranoid. He thinks there’s snakes everywhere.”

“Is that… normal?” Olivia asks, and Pope struggles to refrain from rolling his eyes. He knows Olivia’s family – they order from his dad’s shop all the time. He can’t risk pissing off another Kook Princess. 

But, Jesus, Pope doesn’t understand how Kiara could put up with this bullshit. Pope’s not Kiara’s biggest fan, but he has to believe that even she wouldn’t get along with Olivia. He’s spent all of five minutes talking to her, and he thinks he’s felt a few brain cells die. Anymore time around a Kook girl like this would end his chances of going to college. 

There was a time when Pope would have seen the situation in front of him – John B essentially incapacitated, JJ a complete disaster – and he would have wished that Kiara would come back. He used to think that having a two-on-two system was better, where both Kiara and Pope could corral John B and JJ. Now, standing next to Olivia while the shit is hitting the fan, Pope understands how very wrong he was. His life is so much easier without Kiara and her stupid friends in it. 

“Yeah, this is normal,” Pope says after a second, and Olivia considers it. 

“They’re in the trees!” JJ yells pointing up. “They’re in the fucking trees, man. Pope – look –” JJ says again, somehow maneuvering himself so he almost falls into the fire for the fifth time. Pope catches him, stands him upright, and sighs deeply. 

“Yeah, alright,” Pope says, forcing JJ to walk over to John B. “We’re going home.” 

“Home?” JJ asks, looking at Pope, his eyes wide and terrified.

“Not home-home, you idiot. The Chateau.” Pope says. He has no idea how he’s going to get the three of them home, but he figures the first step would be getting John B off of the log. When Pope gets close enough, he kicks John B’s foot with his own. “Hey, John B, get up. We gotta go home.” 

John B makes a noise that might sound like agreement, but ultimately, he doesn’t move his body into a standing position. Pope looks at Olivia, who was trailing behind them.

“Here, make sure he stays upright,” Pope says, pushing JJ towards Olivia. 

Olivia doesn’t seem happy with the task – she lets out a _harumph_ , but ultimately wraps an arm around JJ. Pope doesn’t like that, either, but he’s got bigger fish to fry. 

Pope stares down at John B for a second, before looking up at the sky. If he were more religious, he would have prayed for forgiveness for whatever sin he must have committed in a past life to be stuck with this. He’s not religious, so he just bends down, and throws his entire body weight into getting John B off the log. 

He ends up overestimating how much dead weight John B carries, and launches himself backwards as John B stands up. While John B somehow, miraculously, stays standing up, Pope ends up landing on his ass in the sand. Olivia giggles as Pope stands and brush sand off of his body.

“Well, it was nice meeting you, Olivia, but we have to go,” Pope says, glaring at her and making it very clear that it was not nice meeting her. 

“Wait!” Olivia protests, interrupting Pope's escape plan. Pope's glare only hardens as she grabs JJ’s arm. She's looking at JJ like she wants him to stand up for her, but he's still eyeing the trees suspiciously. After a second, she turns her attention back to Pope. “I’m going with you!”

“Uh, no you aren’t,” Pope says, scoffing at Olivia's claim. JJ finally looks down from the trees, opening his mouth to protest Pope's decision, but Pope just silences him with a glare. JJ just nods, going back to checking the trees.

“I don’t have a ride home!” Olivia says, stomping her feet in the sand like a child. Now that it's clear JJ has no intention of arguing on her behalf, she's begun whining. 

“Didn’t you come here with a bunch of your friends?” Pope says, gesturing behind her to the group of girls she had shown up to the Boneyard with. The Academy girls are watching the entire exchange through wide eyes. Their huddle is just far enough away to be discreet, and just close enough to hear everything being said. Pope takes advantage of it. “Hey! Can anyone here give Olivia a ride?”

At Pope’s words, the girls look shocked to realize that they've been caught. They all look amongst each other, before one of the girls in the group nods back at Pope.

"Yeah, we have a ride!" The girl who nodded says, and Pope shrugs, turning his attention back to Olivia.

“See, you’ll be fine!” Pope says, dragging JJ and John B away from the fire. When JJ goes to argue, probably that Olivia should go with them, Pope just sighs. “Shut up, JJ.”

Now that Pope has gotten Olivia off his back, he needs to figure out how to get the other two home. He watches them for a second, as John B wanders towards the street and JJ avoids the trees at all costs. 

Pope sighs. It's gonna be a long night. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annnnnd Chapter 15 will be title "Juvenile Delinquency Is Purely A Social Disease"
> 
> (bonus points to whoever knows what that references)


	15. Juvenile Delinquency Is Purely A Social Disease

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A few things to note here: 
> 
> 1.) I have never, not once in my life, been part of a high school theater production that has started anything less than 15 minutes late, but we all need to have a little suspension of disbelief
> 
> 2.) An alternative working title for this chapter could be “Annie tries to write about a high school musical without writing the words 'high-school -musical' in that order because this particular story does not involve Zac Efron”
> 
> 3.) Yes, the title is from West Side Story
> 
> And as always, kudos to my lovely beta lemon_drizzle_cake for staying up way too late to help me with final edits on this chapter :)
> 
> Hope you guys enjoy!!

“You just need to get back in the game,” Sarah says, her voice echoing off the walls of the empty bathroom at Kildare Coast Academy. 

Kiara sighs as she turns off the water in the sink she had been washing her hands in. She turns her attention to Sarah, who’s almost entirely focused on fixing her mascara. Sarah is leaned over the sink, impossibly close to the mirror, her face contorted as she tries to fix the miniscule imperfection that only she can seem to see. 

“I’m not sure I was ever _in_ the game, Sarah,” Kiara says as she pushes away from the sink, moving towards the hand dryer. She slams the button with her elbow to start the flow of air.

“Stop being so mopey!” Sarah yells over the sound of the hand dryer. “Just because Kelce hasn’t texted you since the dance–”

“Out of nowhere!” Kiara interrupts, raising her voice to match Sarah’s. Kiara waits a second, and when the hand dryer halts, she starts talking again. “Everything was going so well! I had so much fun at the dance!” 

“Men are worthless,” Sarah says, leaning away from the mirror. She spends a second checking her eyes, and then she turns to look at Kiara, who has taken to leaning against the wall. “So he suddenly ghosted you after the dance. You need to _move on._ Find another guy. Sure, Kelce was fun at the dance, but he’s not worth two months of agonizing.” 

Kiara grumbles at that. She hasn’t been agonizing for two months – or, at least, she hasn’t been actively agonizing the entire time. 

“Yes, you have,” Sarah says, reading her mind. Kiara hits her with a look. “You haven’t gone on a single date since the dance. You haven’t even talked to another guy!” 

“I just don’t understand,” Kiara says, throwing her hands up, and Sarah just shakes her head. 

“There’s nothing to understand. We are talking about high school boys, Kiara. Understanding boys is for college, or maybe marriage. Right now, you just gotta play the field.”

Kiara rolls her eyes. “Says Sarah, who’s been with Dennis for months,” she says, and Sarah smirks at her. 

“Like I said,” Sarah laughs, “Playing the field.”

“Whatever.” 

Kiara turns her backpack around to find her phone. She finds it buried in one of the pockets, and she starts flipping through her apps until she finds her messages. Her finger hovers over the last text she sent to Kelce – something passive about having a great time at the dance and meeting up at lunch later. She hadn't thought much of it at the time, but now she mulls it over in her head regularly. Was it too forward? Not forward enough? What did Kelce see in it that she didn't?

It’s quiet for a second before Sarah realizes what she’s doing.

“Stop!” Sarah yells, snatching Kiara’s phone from her, and Kiara looks up at her in shock. “Stop agonizing!” 

“I’m not agonizing!” Kiara says, and Sarah puts a hand on her hip. 

“Not agonizing? So you weren’t checking to see if he had magically texted you in the last five minutes?” Sarah challenges, and Kiara deflates. 

“I’m so pathetic,” she says, and Sarah looks at her sympathetically. 

“You aren’t _pathetic._ You just need to get back out there,” Sarah says, and then her eyes light up. “You know, I could –”

“No.”

“I could set you up.”

“No.” 

“If you just let me –”

_“No.”_

“I know so many great guys!” Sarah argues, and Kiara shakes her head. 

“Absolutely not,” Kiara says, moving to pick her backpack up. “Never in a million years.”

Sarah looks like she’s going to argue with Kiara again as she heads to the door of the bathroom, but it swings open with a little too much velocity, stopping both girls in their tracks. 

“It was just _weird,_ ” comes Olivia’s voice, loudly bouncing off the walls of the bathroom. Scarlett enters the bathroom first, trailed closely by Olivia. When Scarlett makes eye contact with Kiara, she rolls her eyes. Clearly, Scarlett is not impressed with whatever story Olivia is spinning. “He just kept yelling about _snakes._ ”

“Hey Kie, hey Sarah,” Scarlett says, dragging Kiara further into the bathroom. When Kiara opens her mouth to argue that they were just leaving, Scarlett eyes narrow at her. “Do not leave me in this bathroom right now,” she whispers through gritted teeth, and Kiara sighs. 

“Who was yelling about snakes?” Sarah asks, moving back to stand in front of the mirror. She clearly got the message that Scarlett wasn’t going to let them leave. Even though both Kiara and Sarah could care less about whatever Olivia’s talking about, Sarah knows that Olivia wants her to ask. She’s the type of person who will loudly talk about the weekend party just to be asked about it. Whatever story Olivia’s telling, she wants everyone to hear about it. It’ll be easier for everyone if Sarah just acts interested in the first place. 

“Ugh,” Olivia says, moving to occupy the mirror next to Sarah. She takes a tube of lipstick out of her backpack as she answers. “JJ fucking Maybank.” 

The air leaves Kiara’s lungs in one fell swoop. She hadn’t actually heard his name – or any of the Pogue’s names – in weeks. It’s strange to hear after so long, especially under the pretense that, somehow, reality has become so fucked up as to allow _Olivia_ to know more about JJ and the Pogues than Kiara does. 

Sarah’s eyes snap back to Kiara through the mirror. Sarah tries to monitor Kiara’s feelings before she continues – the boys are still a sore subject for Kiara, and she never brings them up. 

“Oh,” Sarah says, racking her brain for a way to change the subject. “That’s nice.”

“He was _so_ fucking high at the Boneyard,” Olivia says, not giving Sarah enough time to steer the conversation away from the topic. Olivia shakes her head in amusement as she fixes her lipstick. “He legitimately thought that the trees were full of snakes.” 

At that, Kiara’s blood freezes, and she immediately fixes all her attention on Olivia. 

“What did he take?” Kie barges in, cutting off the end of Olivia’s sentence. Fuck the fight at the Boneyard, fuck whatever stupid rivalry is going on – if JJ is trying to ruin his own goddamn life, she’s going to give him hell for it. Friend or not. 

“What?” Olivia asks, turning to Kiara and raising an eyebrow, clearly confused from the sudden sharp tone Kiara’s adopted.

“What did JJ take?” Kiara says, her tone stern. She speaks slowly, emphasizing every word, hoping Olivia will understand how serious she is. Across the bathroom, Sarah’s sending her a pointed look, eyes wide, silently asking something along the lines of _‘is it normal for JJ to get so high he hallucinates reptiles?’_

Kiara has no idea how to reply. 

Instead of picking up on the gravity of the situation, Olivia’s eyes brighten with recognition. “Oh, that’s right!” She says, her voice too chipper for the topic of conversation. “You went to school with them, didn’t you?”

Normally, a sentence like that would trigger Kiara’s fight or flight instinct – she’s spent several months trying to make herself appear to belong. She’s too worried right now to care about any of that. 

“Olivia-” she pleads.

“He was high, Kiara. On _Marijuana_ ,” Olivia finally answers. She says it half-conspiratorially, as if she was explaining something obvious to someone particularly stupid. 

Kiara’s worries immediately deflate. “Jesus Christ,” she says, turning around. She has to bite her lip to stop herself from making another comment. She takes a second, holding her hand to her forehead, before she turns around to look at the other girls.

She wants to add _‘that’s it?’_ but looking around the bathroom, she knows exactly how that will go over. Sarah’s looking at her in nervous disbelief, and Scarlett has raised her eyebrows, as if she’d be shocked at the revelation if it weren’t a kid from the Cut.

For a second there, Kiara thought Olivia was insinuating that JJ was doing something really bad – some drug that could fuck up the rest of his life. She thought, for lack of a better phrase, that JJ was following in his father’s footsteps.

Luke Maybank is notorious around the island for his affinity towards illegal substances. JJ and Kiara had never really talked about it, save for the occasional comment JJ would make about his dad being a deadbeat coke addict. Even then, Kiara never asked him specifically about his feelings towards his dad’s illicit activities. All Kiara needed to know was that it had, essentially, ruined Luke’s life, and he had taken JJ’s and his mom’s life with it. 

JJ going down that sort of path was, potentially, one of the scariest things Kiara had ever heard. She knows the statistics and the figures about addiction being genetic, but she never truly worried about JJ in that sense. He talked about his father with such disdain that Kiara couldn’t imagine JJ emulating him in any regard. 

In all honesty, it really doesn’t feel like the end of the world that JJ’s trying weed, at least to Kiara. The Pogues were never involved with drugs when Kiara was around them, and even the occasional beer was enough to send Pope into a stress-induced panic attack. Despite that, she had always assumed, at some point, JJ or John B (and maybe even she herself) would venture into weed, or something similarly low-stakes. Honestly, given it’s ubiquity on the Cut, she’s surprised they hadn’t gotten into it earlier. 

Sarah, Olivia, and Scarlett are a completely different story. These girls live in a protective bubble – people on Figure Eight still unironically refer to weed as _‘The Devil’s Lettuce,’_ after all. Kiara knows there’s older students at the Academy who smoke, or even venture into harder drugs, but that won’t be Scarlett, Sarah, and Olivia. They are the pinnacle of high society on the island, and something as innocuous as weed is a social disgrace among their ranks. 

“I mean, isn’t that how the Boneyard parties always are?” Scarlett asks dismissively after a second of silence, whipping her phone out of her back pocket as if to indicate that she’s already over the conversation.

“I’ve been to a few Boneyard parties, and I’ve never seen him like _that,”_ Olivia says as she zips up her backpack. “I think he smoked _a lot_ of weed. Like, even that John B kid smoked the same stuff as JJ, and he was way more chill.”

Of course John B was there too. Learning that the two of them got high together definitely settles any remaining worry in Kiara’s mind. JJ doing drugs is one thing, but if John B was right there with him, he couldn’t get into too much trouble. Wherever JJ and John B are, Pope couldn’t have been far away. As long as the three of them were together, they’d find a way to take care of each other, just like they always had. 

“Isn’t his dad a crackhead, too? Like father, like son,” Scarlett says casually without looking up from her phone. Scarlett doesn’t really mean anything by it, she’s just speaking about the Pogues and the kids from the Cut the same way everyone from Figure Eight does. Kiara’s heard enough of it to learn to stomach it, but this one hits a little too close to home. The comparison between Luke and JJ is enough to make Kiara forget where she is and who she is talking to.

“No,” Kiara says immediately. “No, JJ isn’t anything like Luke.” 

Scarlett looks up from her phone, and both her and Olivia stare at Kiara for a second. Neither of them are used to Kiara so obviously reminding everyone about her affiliation with the Pogues, especially not twice in one conversation.

“So, you were friends with JJ, right?” Olivia says, turning back to the mirror. 

“Yeah,” Kiara says, and she shuts her mouth after the word leaves her mouth. She was either going to follow it up with ‘ _for several years’_ or ‘ _but not anymore’_ , and neither of those statements feel right. 

“Was that Pope kid always so fucking rude?” Olivia asks after she realizes Kiara’s not willing to give out any more information. 

Kiara startles for a second. “What?”

“The Pope kid. He was so fucking rude to me. I was trying to help him get JJ back to his house, and he basically told me to fuck off,” Olivia explains.

Kiara can’t help it – her face breaks into a little bit of a smile. The thought of Pope and Olivia talking is amusing – the conversation couldn’t have been anything but physically painful for Pope. Kiara couldn’t even imagine a single ounce of shared interests between the two of them – except maybe not liking each other. She tries to imagine the scene at the Boneyard, with JJ high as a kite, John B somewhere acting _‘more chill’,_ and Olivia trying to converse with Pope. The image is nothing if not comical.

When Olivia gives her a dirty look, Kiara immediately tries to drop the smile from her face. “Oh, yeah, that’s Pope,” Kiara says fondly, a hint of a smile still playing on her lips and an ache growing in her chest. 

  
  


\---------

  
  


“Do you want to talk about it?” Sarah asks, swinging around to stare at Kiara. Kiara squints at Sarah in response. 

“About?” Kiara says, moving out of the way of an oncoming bicyclist. Walking with Sarah back to Tanneyhill is now part of Kiara’s everyday routine, but it’s only in the last couple of weeks that downtown Kildare has really started becoming busy. As the summer season begins, the sidewalks are packed and the restaurants have their outdoor seating spread across the terraces. There were months in the winter when Kiara and Sarah could walk home from school and not pass another soul. 

“About the fact that you just found out your best friend from middle school is smoking dope?” Sarah says, lowering her voice so the family of tourists nearby aren’t permanently traumatized. 

“He wasn’t smoking _dope,_ Sarah, he was smoking weed,” Kiara says, and she shrugs her shoulder. “And, I mean, I guess I am a little worried. It’s not the end of the world, though. It’s pretty common on the cut.”

Kiara only feels comfortable speaking like this because she’s speaking to Sarah. Whereas Olivia, and even Scarlett, would judge Kiara for speaking the truth, Sarah just takes it in stride. Sarah still has the vestige of a girl from High Society Figure Eight – she’ll never understand the relaxed attitude towards weed on the Cut, not even if one day she starts popping molly at an upperclassman’s party. But Sarah also isn’t about to call JJ a _crackhead._

“If I found out you or Scarlett were smoking dope, I would stage an intervention,” Sarah says sagely, like she’s stating something groundbreaking. 

“First of all, again, it’s not dope,” Kiara says, smiling at Sarah. Her smile falls after a second, though, as she thinks about Sarah’s word. “And I couldn’t stage an intervention if I wanted to.” 

“I’m not saying you need to be a therapist to those assholes. I’m just saying, if you want to talk about it, I’m here,” Sarah says, but Kiara’s starting to zone out. She nods at Sarah’s words, but her focus is fixed on a sign ahead, standing on the street corner by the pharmacy. 

_Kildare County Public High School_

_proudly presents_

_West Side Story_

_7:00 PM_

_May 10th - 13th_

Kiara had almost completely forgotten about the musical. She isn’t even entirely sure Pope is still involved in the production – he could have dropped out anytime in the last few months, and she never would have known. 

Kiara stares blankly at the sign as an idea forms in her head. Sarah is right, she shouldn’t be the boy’s therapist – but checking on them might not be a bad idea. Especially if she can go with a crowd, and observe them from a distance. 

“... I mean, all the emotional legwork woman have to endure –” 

“Sarah,” Kiara interrupts her as she sets up the plan in her head. “I, uh, completely forgot. I have a shift with my dad tonight.” 

As she finishes speaking, Kiara turns to look at Sarah. Sarah stops talking, looking at Kiara in disappointment. 

“No manicure night tonight?” she asks, her face falling into an almost comical frown. 

“Not tonight, no. Tomorrow?” Kiara compromises, and Sarah shrugs after a second. 

“You sure your dad wouldn’t let you off?” Sarah asks.

“Uh, he probably would, but I’d feel bad bailing on him,” Kiara says, trying not to cringe at her own words. 

“Alright,” Sarah huffs. “I guess my nails can wait another day.” 

“I think you’ll survive,” Kiara says, bouncing up on her toes. “But I should really get going! Can’t be late for my shift.” 

“Bye? I guess?” Sarah says as Kiara takes off down the street in the direction of the Wreck. “That was so weird,” Sarah says to no one but herself.

  
  


\---------

  
  


At 7:10, Kiara shuffles quietly into Kildare County High School’s main auditorium, wearing an oversized hoodie and clutching a bouquet of yellow flowers in her arms. The mother sitting at the admissions table had given her a weird look out in the hallway, but Kiara had ignored her as she received her ticket.

She picks a seat in the very last row, sliding into the seat as the last notes of the first song in the musical fade out. It had been Kiara’s intention to get to the theater after the musical started, and she’s glad it worked out as well as it did. The darkness of the auditorium makes it impossible for her to see if JJ and John B are in the crowd, but that works to her advantage – if she can’t find them, it’s very unlikely that they’ll see her. 

She may not be able to find JJ and John B, but she sees Pope almost immediately. He is dressed in a cheap looking leather jacket, dancing on stage to some song about jets. Kiara hadn’t ever seen West Side Story before – in fact, this performance would mark the first time Kiara’s ever shown any interest in live theater. Her mom was understandably shocked when Kiara asked her to pick her up from the high school’s production. 

Kiara had tried to google the synopsis, but she didn’t have time to read it in between picking up the flowers and walking to the school, so she spends most of the first half of the show completely confused. She becomes even more confused when the stage goes completely dark, and the lights in the auditorium switch on. 

Kiara had been diligently monitoring the songs, keeping track of how long it was until the end of the show. Kiara’s plan was to sneak in and out of the auditorium in the dark – get there late and leave early. She’d throw her flowers on the admissions table and hope someone would find a way to get them to Pope. That way, she’d be able to get by without actually seeing anyone. Anonymity is the name of the game when stalking your ex-best friends. 

She hadn’t taken into account intermission. Honestly, she hadn’t even remembered that intermissions were a thing musicals did. 

_Fuck._

As the lights in the auditorium brighten, Kiara slips further down in her seat. She’s in the middle of the last row of the auditorium, alone save for the seat that’s occupied by Pope’s flowers. If anyone she recognizes heads towards the hallway, there would be no way they could miss her. 

_Fuck._

She sees John B and JJ stand up in the front row, and Kiara briefly contemplates booking it out of the auditorium. There’s enough people up and milling around that she might be able to get out without making a scene.

She doesn’t even get a chance to get out of her seat before Pope, along with a few of the other ensemble kids, sneak out from behind the curtain. Most of the kids go to see their parents, but Pope makes a beeline for JJ and John B. 

Pope hops off the stage, showing off his Jets costume, before hugging John B and JJ. They aren’t talking very loud, but the auditorium is small and people are quickly filing out. Kiara can hear a little bit of what they are saying. 

“You’re a natural up there, man,” JJ says, clapping Pope on the back. It’s a nice sentiment, but it’s also almost completely a lie. 

Pope’s not as bad as Kiara thought he might be, but his talent doesn’t scream _natural_. He’s a little awkward, but it’s not the worst thing Kiara has ever seen. His dance moves sometimes meet their mark, and Kiara can’t really hear if he’s singing off key in the ensemble. It’s not perfect, but it’s a start, and Kiara can’t help but feel proud of him for getting up on stage. The boys aren’t hers anymore, and she doesn’t really have any claim over this sense of pride, but that doesn’t stop it from bubbling up within her. 

As if to remind her how very far away she is from the boys, a group of girls stand up from a little farther back in the auditorium and approach the boys. She doesn’t recognize them, but it vaguely reminds her of the year she and JJ made fun of John B’s Fan Club. She fully expects JJ to scoff at the girls, or at least ignore them, but he doesn’t. Instead, he shrugs an arm around one of them, and laughs loudly when they start ribbing on Pope’s jacket. John B and Pope laugh good naturedly, discussing the musical and Pope’s performance. 

Kiara’s eyes start to water when she realizes the Pogues have started to replace her. 

It’s not that she blames them, really. It’s been months, and she’s moved on. It’s not like she hadn’t expected them to move on as well, but it still feels shitty to be confronted with it so obviously. 

Eventually, Pope disappears, and the lights flicker on and off in the auditorium. The girls sit next to JJ and John B, rather than returning to their own seats, and Kiara tries to quell the jealousy she feels. When the lights in the auditorium finally go out, she sits up a little in her seat and tries to pretend she’s crying over the cheesy love story.

  
  


\---------

  
  


Kiara ducks out during the bows. Honestly, she got what she came for at intermission – she had seen all the boys, and they seemed fine. For some reason, she doesn’t leave until the very last second, though. As the bows are ending, she runs out of the auditorium, throwing her flowers on a random table and dashing towards the front of the school.

Where she stands for another twenty minutes. 

Honestly, she should have known. This isn’t the first time Anna has been late to pick her up, although it’s a fairly new phenomenon. When Kiara was spending time on the Cut, her mom would run about fifteen minutes early whenever picking her up. Now that Kiara’s hanging around with Sarah and Scarlett, Anna seems to permanently run about half an hour late.

Kiara hides behind one of the pillars near the front of the school as the attendees and cast members walk out of the school. She recognizes some people, but thankfully no one sees her. The Pogues are one of the last groups out of the school, and Kiara holds her breath as they exit the school. 

“I don’t know, man,” JJ says, holding the door open for John B. 

“I think it was Allie,” John B says, turning around to face Pope. “She has a thing for you.”

“She wasn’t even here tonight, man.” Pope says, holding up the bouquet of flowers Kiara had left for him. She’s thankful that Pope got the flowers, but she sends up a little prayer to any merciful god willing to listen that he won’t be able to figure out it’s her handwriting.

“Yeah, how do you know she wasn’t here?” JJ says, his tone teasing, and Pope remains silent. “Huh? How do you know?”

“Cause she’s coming tomorrow night,” Pope grumbles out, and JJ and John B break into a chorus of _‘awww’_.

“Our little Pope’s got his girlfriend coming to his show tomorrow night,” JJ says, poking Pope’s nose. Pope swats his hand away. 

“She’s not my girlfriend yet,” Pope says, and John B and JJ high five.

“Yet!” John B says, and he points a finger towards Pope. “But soon!”

Kiara doesn’t even know what the boys are talking about. It feels like an out of body experience to be this close to the Pogues and not understand anything they are saying. It’s never happened before. Even at the Boneyard, when they were fighting, she didn’t feel like this. Like she had never been a part of their lives. She doesn’t even know who Allie is. Jesus. 

“J! Pope!” 

A female voice calls as the doors to the school open once again, and the girls from before exit the school in a group. “You can’t leave us!” The same girl says as she approaches the group, pulling Pope into a hug. “I didn’t think you had it in you, you nailed that box step!”

“Thanks, Alex. Couldn’t have done it without your badgering,” Pope says fondly, and Alex smiles back at him. 

“My pleasure.”

“Oh, Pope. Who are the flowers from?” the girl standing closest to John B asks, and Kiara tries to crane her neck to see if she recognizes her. She went to school with these people for eight years before transferring to the Academy – she should at least find their faces familiar, but she has no such luck. The girls are as good as strangers. 

“I don’t know,” Pope admits, turning the flowers over in his hands. “It wasn’t any of you, right?”

“Nah, we wouldn’t get you roses. That’s some romantic shit, Pope,” the girl next to JJ states. 

“Yellow roses symbolize friendship, Peeler,” the girl named Alex says, and Peeler makes a small noise of recognition. “What does the card say?”

“ _I’m so proud of you! Love always,_ ” Pope reads off the card, before turning it over and holding it up for everyone else to read. “And then it has a little heart.”

“No name?” Peeler says, and JJ shoves her shoulder. 

“You think we’d be this confused if someone signed the fucking card?” JJ asks incredulously, and Peeler reaches up to give him a noogie. “Dumbass,” he says, laughing as he dodges her attack. 

“Yeah, y’all are dumbasses and might miss the signature,” the final unnamed girl states, taking the card from Pope. “I don’t recognize the handwriting,” she says, scanning over the letter, and Kiara hopes the boys don’t look too closely. She tried to write it in as indistinct a scrawl as possible, but she knew she fucked up when she drew the heart. Her hearts are pretty unique – drawn in one spiky motion – and she didn’t have time to redo the card before getting to the show. If the boys think about it too long, they might realize it’s her.

“It looks so familiar–” John B starts. 

“Hey!” JJ says suddenly, effectively ending any debate about the note, his arm going around John B. 

Kiara cringes at the act of casual intimacy. Small gestures like that used to be so familiar to her, and she misses it desperately now. Even with her female friends, she doesn’t have anything resembling the casual cuddling, the hugs, the back rubs or full body tackles she was used to with the boys. Sure, she hugs her friends sometimes, and she’ll occasionally cuddle with Sarah, but it’s nothing like it used to be. After years of growing up with the cuddliest group of boys in the world, she is suddenly touch starved. She hates it. 

“I say we celebrate,” JJ says, continuing after his successful redirection. “Our man Pope is headed for Broadway, this may be the last chance we get to party with him before he leaves us for New York City.”

“Could you do _Pogues: The Musical?_ ” Peeler says teasingly, and Pope just rolls his eyes. 

“Assholes,” Pope mutters to the two of them, but he’s smiling. 

Kiara’s stunned to hear the girl use the word _Pogues_ so casually. Sure, she’s heard other people use it before, but it was strictly a John B-JJ-Pope-Kiara thing before. She hadn’t heard many people use it outside of the actual Pogues. 

Unless these girls have become Pogues since she left. Despite JJ’s insistence, they had never come up with a formal induction ceremony or any way of adding members to the Pogues. It just happened with the four of them, and they hadn’t needed to add anyone else since. She used to assume that if someone wanted to join the Pogues, it would be a democratic venture between the four of them. 

Maybe the girls have joined the Pogues. Maybe the boys have shifted their friend group like Kiara shifted hers. 

“What do you have in mind, Captain Maybank?” John B says, and Kiara would laugh at John B’s tone if she weren’t so damn sad. 

“Rixon’s Cove, anyone?” JJ says, and Kiara’s thankful that the cheers from the new Pogues drown out her sharp intake of breath. Rixon is a Pogue thing – where they had campfires and celebrated the best and worst days of their lives. She knew, theoretically, that the boys still went there without her, but it’s just further proof that they have really moved on. 

She has been trying to kid herself for months now that she’s over it – the boys were once her best friends who she outgrew, they have changed and now they’re people she can’t recognize, and she’s found better friends in Scarlett and Sarah and maybe Olivia. If tonight proved anything, it proved that Kiara was wrong. She’s still very, very much not over it. 

It comes as a final blow when JJ lifts his arm up, running his hand through his hair, and Kiara notices something is off. His wrist, usually crowded with bracelets, is completely bare. 

All her friendship bracelets are gone. 

She takes in a deep breath, staring as he casually lowers his arm out of view. As the boys and their new friends walk away, she slides down the side of the pillar. She stares, unblinkingly, at her own wrist. Despite the fight at the Boneyard and her insistence that she was over the Pogues, Kiara hasn’t taken off her friendship bracelets. Even now, the bracelets that used to match with JJ’s are tied around her wrist. The only way to get them off would be to cut them, and that’s always seemed too permanent for Kiara. 

The pain in her chest feels acute enough that it might collapse her entire body. 

She hears the group leaving the entryway of the school, and Kiara covers her mouth with her hand to stifle a sob.

The friendship bracelets represent a lot for her, and the fact that JJ has taken them off feels significant. Even after the Boneyard, it had not crossed her mind to take them off. She’s worn them for so long, it feels like they are a colorful, patterned extension of her own skin. JJ taking them off – and, even though she hadn’t explicitly seen it, she’s fairly certain Pope and John B did the very same – feels like both a betrayal and a heartbreak. Sure, they were fighting, and mean things were said at the Boneyard, but she still feels blindsided. Something about this feels more permanent. This feels like she can never go back. Kiara had spent the last few months without the Pogues by her side, acting like she never wanted to go back to the way things used to be. She was able to pretend, to act like she was fine with that, and she often reminded herself that middle school friendships fade. 

But Kiara also knows, deep down in the core of her being, that she belongs at Rixon’s Cove with them. She should be walking with the boys, congratulating Pope and telling John B to lay off with the theater puns. She shouldn’t be collapsed besides a pillar in the dark, a hoodie hiding her identity from the only people who might have ever known her. 

Her heart stops when she hears JJ call out, “Is that Kiara’s mom?” 

Kiara peeps her head out from behind the pillar to see what JJ is talking about. Lo and behold, her mom's careening up the school's driveway, shooting directly past the Pogues. Anna Carrera has impeccable timing, truly. 

“Who?” John B asks.

“Kiara’s mom. Kiara Carerra,” JJ explains, and Kiara’s heart breaks all over again. It’s like John B doesn’t even remember her. Fuck, it’s like she doesn’t even remember herself. 

“Oh,” John B says. “Yeah, no. Definitely not.” 

“Definitely not,” Pope agrees, dismissing JJ. “What would she be doing here?” 

“Yeah,” JJ says, his voice distant and distracted. “Yeah, you’re right.”

  
  
  


\---------

  
  


When her mom asks, Kiara blames her tears on the musical. Makes up some nonsense about the high school production being very moving or some shit. Anna takes her at her word, and tries not to ask too many prying questions on the way home. 

Kiara doesn’t dare tempt herself until she’s locked safely in her room, but once she’s closed the door, she can’t help it. She opens up her phone, swiping until she gets to _The Pogue Lyfe T-Shirt Company_ group chat. She opens it, tries to refresh it, but it just stays stuck on a message Pope had left a few weeks ago. Her keyboard disappears when she opens the page. Over the last few months, she’s been privy to enough drama at the Academy to know exactly what that means.

She’s been blocked from _The Pogue Lyfe T-Shirt Company_. 

She bites back a sob as she reads the last message sent through the chat before she was kicked out – she hadn’t been blocked a few weeks ago, when Pope had messaged the group with a stupid meme about algebra. She hadn’t opened it at the time, figuring that Pope had just accidentally chosen to send it in the wrong group chat. She figured the boys had a new group chat without her in it, and any messages sent to that chat were just a mistake. 

She knows what this all means. She can’t ever go back to them, even if she wanted to. Even just to check on them. She’s no longer welcome. 

As tears pour out of her eyes, she stomps over to her desk, opening up her drawers looking for a pair of scissors. She holds up her wrist, a sob wracking through her body as she slits the scissors underneath the friendship bracelets, tearing them off her arm. The delicately weaved designs hack apart, the hours of work she had dedicated to commemorating her friends ruined in seconds. One by one, the bracelets turn into an unrecognizable pile of embroidery floss. Her favorite yellow one, the first one she made that matched the one JJ used to wear, goes in the trash first. It’s followed quickly by the remnants of the other bracelets: the blue one she matched with John B, the purple one with Pope, the one she had made on the plane to Los Angeles in middle school when she started to miss her boys.

Throwing out each of the bracelets is like throwing out her memories, and her body is racked by sobs with each of them. It feels like she spends hours hacking apart the bracelets, and when she’s done, she’s exhausted. Her whole body aches with it. She sinks to the ground, cuddling her knees to her chest, trying to calm her breathing. She had thought she was over it, but it feels like she’s been barred from returning home. 

It’s all her fault. She should have tried harder to apologize, she should have worked harder to balance the Pogues and Sarah. She should have tried anything to keep her friends. She took it for granted that they would always be there. Everytime it felt like she lost them, she never truly believed it. Everytime, it felt worse. 

But this? This feels final. The group chat, the bracelets, the new friends they have? Kiara doesn’t belong with them anymore. She hadn’t belonged with them in a while, probably, but it feels like she can never go back now. Even if she wanted to. 

She stands up on shaky legs, kicking over the trashcan in the process. She climbs in her bed, pulling the covers way over her head, and she cries until she can’t breathe.

  
  


\--------

  
  
  


Kiara smiles politely at the waiter for what feels like the seventeenth time. 

“Sorry, it’ll just be a few more minutes.” 

The waiter looks at her apologetically, as if he knew what was going on, and Kiara has to clench her hands under the table. She _really_ doesn’t need the waiter’s pity – this entire thing is stupid. She should just go home. 

As the waiter turns away from her table, Kiara’s shoulders fall. She doesn’t feel angry so much as disappointed. She might even feel a little sad – or, screw that, really sad. It’s not like she’s particularly into Dave, but between this and the thing with Kelce, she can’t help but feel like there is something wrong with her. 

When Kiara woke up the morning after the musical, she finally resolved to text Sarah and ask her to set her up on a date. She still doesn’t know why it felt right after getting her heart ripped out by her old friends, but it had, and Kiara brushed it aside not wanting to look too much into it. 

Sarah was, unsurprisingly, thrilled by the new development. She wasted no time and set her up with a guy named Dave, some friend of Dennis’s that Sarah said was lucky to even get a date with Kiara. 

Well, clearly, Dave doesn’t share the same sentiment, considering he chose to stand her up. Sitting at the empty table in the restaurant feels way, way too similar to the feeling that used to settle into her stomach when she sat at an empty lunch table in the Academy cafeteria in the beginning of the year. It royally sucks.

Kiara takes a deep breath, trying to maintain a hold on her emotions. Dave isn’t worth the anxiety. And Kiara isn’t an outsider, here or anywhere else on Figure Eight. She has Sarah, and no one can make her feel unworthy anymore. Speaking of which…

  
  


**_Kie <3_ **

_No._

**_Sarah <3_ **

_No? He’s still not there?_

**_Kie <3_ **

_Nope._

**_Sarah <3_ **

_Asshole_

  
  
  


Kiara’s about to give up, to order a hamburger to-go and get out out of the stupid restaurant and the even stupider dress Sarah helped her pick out only a few hours ago. She raises her hand to wave down the waiter, but someone comes up behind her, grads her hand, and clumsily slides into the seat across from her. 

Kiara fully expects it to be Dave, and she opens her mouth to give him a piece of her mind when she recognizes it’s not Dave at all – not unless Dave had recently grown a sheet of honey blonde hair and learned to straighten it to perfection. 

_“Sarah?”_ Kiara says, shocked, and Sarah just smiles and nods at her, looking back to find the waiter. 

Among the white table cloths and four-fork displays on every table, Sarah looks completely out of place. She’s hopelessly underdressed for fine dining, wearing jean cut offs, a tube top, and flip flops. There’s a sheen of sweat across her forehead, like she had just run all the way to the restaurant, and she’s just slightly out of breath. Kiara wonders if maybe she really did run all the way here. She doesn’t really care, though – either way, the sight of Sarah is a welcome relief.

“Yep,” Sarah says, as if nothing out of the ordinary is happening. “What do you want?”

“What?” Kiara says, her brain still struggling to follow the sequence of events. 

“What do you want? Pick anything – Ward Cameron is paying,” Sarah says, winking at Kiara and whipping out her dad’s credit card from her back pocket. 

“Sarah –” Kiara says, but she’s cut off by the waiter. 

“Hello, ladies! Is there anything I can get for you?” The waiter says, and Sarah smiles up at him. 

“Could we please get a pitcher of lavender lemonade and a charcuterie board to start? We’re still looking over the entrees.”

Sarah’s smile is sickly sweet, but the waiter seems highly receptive to it. He jots down the order quickly, before looking up at the two of them again. 

“Anything else?” he asks, and Sarah just shakes her head. He glances at Kiara, but when she doesn’t say anything, he nods and walks away from the table, promising the appetizers will be out soon. 

“Sarah Cameron, what the fuck?” Kiara says, and Sarah looks at her with wide eyes. 

“Do you not want the cheese board? We can ask for bruschetta instead–” Sarah says, already turning to wave down the waiter again. Kiara grabs her hand, stopping her from causing more of a ruckus in the dining room. The table a few feet away is already giving the two of them dirty looks.

“No, not the cheese board – Sarah, what are you doing here?” Kiara says. “How’d you get here so fast?”

Sarah sighs, blowing some hair out of her eyes. 

“Well, when you texted me the first time saying he was fifteen minutes late, I started to head over here just in case. And then when you were sure he wasn’t coming, I decided that if he can’t see how awesome you are, I can do the honor of taking you out on a date. Well, at Ward Cameron’s expense,” Sarah says, smiling, and Kiara wants to leap across the table and hug her to death. “Also, the lavender lemonade here is to die for. Rose gets it with vodka, but I doubt we’ll be able to pull that off.” 

Kiara laughs outrightly at this, and she suddenly feels better. She feels lighter than she had, even when she had come into the restaurant. “Thank you, Sarah,” Kiara says seriously, and Sarah just rolls her eyes. 

“I’m the one that set you up with that asshat. The least I could do is pay for the disaster I created,” Sarah says, shrugging a shoulder. She says it like it means nothing, but it means the world to Kiara. “By the way, what are you getting? I’m thinking the fillet mignon, but the salmon’s also really good–”

“The salmon is $50,” Kiara points out, and Sarah waves the credit card in front of Kiara one more time. 

“Ward Cameron’s bank account, baby,” Sarah says, and Kiara laughs with her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annnnnd on that note, the next chapter is titled: "An Increasingly Improbable Combination Of Unpleasant Events"


	16. An Increasingly Improbable Combination Of Unpleasant Events

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sooo... this one took a little longer than expected to write, but it was mostly just because I had a busy weekend. This chapter is shorter, but it lays out a little bit of the groundwork for the upcoming chapters. 
> 
> Also, just a reminder, if you want to follow me on tumblr, my username is [ YellowLaboratory ](https://yellowlaboratory.tumblr.com/)! I often post updates about my writing process in the tags of things I reblog, in case you are ever wondering how crazy I am. 
> 
> As always, thank you to my beta, lemon_drizzle_cake!!

“Thanks for this, Ted.”

Big John grunts as he heaves a duffle bag into the _Amy Marie._ He spares a glance at his brother, standing on the dock with his hands on his hips, watching Big John struggle with the supplies. Big John smirks – he would complain that Teddy isn’t helping, but he’s already asking so much of his brother. The fact that Teddy is even in the Outer Banks right now is a blessing in itself. Despite all that, he still has to quell his instinct to yell at Teddy to lift a hand. It’s not like years of being an older brother can disappear overnight. 

“No problem,” Teddy says, squinting in the glaring sun. “Georgia was getting boring anyways.”

Big John huffs out a laugh at that, nodding his head. “Hopefully you won’t be gone from work for too long.” 

Teddy shrugs. “Whatever you need, big guy. Work’ll be there when you get back.”

Teddy’s nonchalant attitude doesn’t come as a surprise to Big John. Teddy’s a hard worker, don’t get him wrong – it’s damn near impossible to grow up on the Cut and not gain some appreciation for hard, manual labor. But Teddy, for all his hard work, could give a fuck about his job. He has no loyalty to the construction companies he consults for, and if one has enough of it and fires him, he’ll just move to the next one. Their mom used to say that Teddy’s carefree attitude would be the death of him. In this instance, Big John’s thankful for it. 

“You need to promise me something, Teddy,” Big John says after a minute, scanning the parking lot of the marina for a figure that won’t appear. 

“I mean, I can try -”

“No, Teddy. Seriously. I know you are doing a lot for me already, just by being here, and I appreciate it,” Big John sighs, turning back towards the boat. “But more than anything, John B needs to be alright. He needs to stay out of trouble. For however long I’m gone.” 

“Keeping that kid out of trouble is like tryna keep a moth from a lantern,” Teddy says, and Big John looks at him sideways. Big John gets the point, but Teddy always had the weirdest way of phrasing things. 

“I’m not saying the kid needs to become a saint. I just mean, try to keep him out of the police station,” Big John says, and Teddy laughs at that. 

“I’ll try my damndest, John.” 

“Another thing,” Big John adds as an afterthought. “Don’t tell him about Ward.” 

Teddy’s mood immediately darkens. “You know I don’t like you getting involved with that man.”

“I know. But I can handle myself. If shit goes sideways - well, John B won’t be able to handle himself. You gotta make sure, no matter what, that kid doesn’t end up getting himself killed.” Big John heaves the last bag onto the boat, turning to look at his brother.

Teddy stares at him stoically. Big John can tell he wants to argue, to try and talk Big John out of the partnership and the search for the gold, but he just nods instead. “I’ll do my best man. Keep him out of trouble - his friend too.” 

Big John smirks at the mention of JJ. God, his brother’s got quite the mess to deal with for the next few weeks. “Good luck keeping both of them out of trouble. Mother Theresa could lose her patience with those boys sometimes.”

“Good thing I ain’t Mother Theresa,” Teddy says through a toothy grin, and Big John claps him on the shoulder.

“Alright, then,” Big John says, moving to step onto the boat. “Might as well get going.” 

“You aren’t gonna wait for John B?” Teddy says, looking back around the marina to make sure he hadn’t missed the boy’s appearance. 

Big John nods solemnly. From his vantage point, he can see the entire marina lot – the fisherman packing up from a long morning on the water, the family taking their little cigarette boat out, and Twinkie the van, parked about halfway down the lot, waiting for Teddy to drive her home. 

If Big John stands on his toes, he can make out the bar JJ’s dad is probably at, the elementary school where John B and JJ met each other, and, farther up the coast, he can just make out the curve of the shore that constitutes the Boneyard. His son has spent most of the last few months there, and if he had to guess, he’d bet money that he and JJ were there now.

He hadn’t seen John B since their fight, and since Teddy had arrived, John B’s door had been locked up tighter than Fort Knox. 

Maybe Big John should be upset, but he just kind of feels relieved. John B never came to say goodbye to him on any of his other excursions, and the lack of his presence makes it feel normal. Even if it’s not normal, and Big John’s heart is kind of pounding out of his chest with the possibilities and the dangers, this small familiar thing feels comforting. 

Big John’s trying not to hype himself up too much. It’s just a normal excursion, with the same probability of success as all the rest of his excursions. He’ll meet Ward at his dock, tell him about his findings and the deal. If all goes well, by the end of the week, he’ll have definite proof of the location of the gold and a lawyer willing to draft a contract for him and Ward. 

He doesn’t need to say goodbye to John B. He’ll be home soon enough. 

Big John shrugs. “We already said goodbye,” he says, before swinging one leg into the boat. “Besides, I’ll be back before you know it. No need for fancy pleasantries.”

  
  


\---------

  
  
  


_2 months later_

  
  


“I just don’t know what to tell him,” Teddy says, leaning back in the chair. He rubs a hand over his face. “I was never meant for this, Sue. There’s a reason I don’t have kids.”

“You need to start by telling me the truth, Teddy,” Susan Peterkin says, looking up at him from her stack of papers. “I ain’t buying the story you’re spinning.”

“What do you want me to say, Sue?” Teddy sighs. “He disappeared a few months ago. Said he needed to take care of some shit. Haven’t heard from him since, don’t know what happened.” 

“You seem awfully unconcerned for someone who’s brother is missing at sea,” Sue remarks, looking at Teddy with a pointed glare. 

“He told me he might be gone for a while,” Teddy shrugs. “I just didn’t think it’d be months.”

“You never asked him?” Sue presses again, and Teddy rolls his eyes. As if this isn’t the seventeenth time he’s had this conversation with her.

“No, Sue. Johnny said he had a lead, and he needed someone to watch John B for a little bit. Never really crossed my mind to demand exact dates.”

“I don’t need exact dates,” Sue says, standing up and coming around the side of her desk. “A rough estimate would do.” 

“Don’t have that either, unfortunately.” Teddy says, and it’s silent for a second. “Look, I’m not even sure he’s in any trouble. This might all be part of his plan.” 

“Plan for what? Finding buried treasures?” Sue’s tone is incredulous, and Teddy tries not to take offense at it.

“Don’t tease, Sue. You know how it is.”

“I’m just asking: what lead is good enough to pull a single father away from his son?” Sue postures leaning forward. When Teddy doesn’t answer, Sue presses on. “And if that lead were to exist, I’m sure there’s others that would want to get in on it. That sum of cash is enough to make people do crazy things.”

“Like leave their son for months on end,” Teddy tries to steer the conversation away from where he knows Sue wants it to go, but she’s having none of it. 

“Like try to eliminate the competition,” Sue says, and Teddy hangs his head back. 

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“Did Big John have any agreements? Back door business deals?”

“I’m not one to spread rumors.”

“This is a _police investigation.”_

“I don’t know what you are investigating, Sheriff. There’s no dead bodies,” Teddy reminds her, and Sue shrugs one shoulder. 

“Don’t need to have a dead body to have an investigation,” she reminds him. “And if I’m not investigating anything, why do you keep coming here and asking me questions?”

“You’re right,” Teddy says, standing up swiftly and grabbing his jacket. “I don’t know what I’m doing here.” 

“If you don’t give me anything to work with, I’m gonna need to post it in the newspapers.”

Teddy freezes at her words. He’s been trying to keep his growing anxiety from John B, and an ad taken out in the newspaper sure isn’t going to help that. He had asked Sue to keep the missing persons report somewhat underwraps, but he knew sooner or later, gossip around the island would grab hold of the fact that Big John had been missing for months. 

“Sue…” he pleads, but she shakes her head.

“I’m just telling you how it is, Teddy. I asked around a few other stations, and no one’s seen or heard anything. I’ve got pressure to open up the investigation. If I keep a lid on it for too much longer, it’s going to look bad for both of us,” Sue explains, leaning her hip against the desk. 

“What do you need to keep it closed?” Teddy asks, and Sue shrugs.

“A lead. Something of value to the investigation, something that we want to keep under wraps.” Sue stares out her window for a second. “You know, like a suspect.”

“I don’t know any suspect, Sue,” Teddy says, turning towards the door. “Give me until next week to tell John B.” 

“I can give you until Tuesday without a lead,” Sue offers, and Teddy nods solemnly. 

“Tuesday it is.”

  
  


\---------

  
  


Teddy doesn’t like this situation. 

He doesn’t like his brother disappearing, he doesn’t like his sudden new role as a Substitute Dad, he doesn’t like the pressure from Sue Peterkin. He doesn’t like any of it. 

He should have known Big John was in deeper shit than he let on when he left. Big John’s an unwavering figure, someone Teddy has spent his entire life looking up to. He’s larger than life. Whatever had him hopping on a boat and fleeing the Outer Banks without his own son had to be pressing. If he was smart, he would have read the warning signs for what they were and told Big John _absolutely the fuck not._

It’s not that Teddy dosen’t like John B – quite the opposite, in fact. John B’s awesome, and spending a few months with the kid is only proving more and more to Teddy how much he likes him. What Teddy doesn’t like is parenting – the laundry, the chores, the grades, the discipline. Teddy’s ready to throw in the towel on the entire thing and tell John B to quit it all. John B can become a professional surfer or some shit – just as long as he never comes back to Teddy with a fucking _Algebra Worksheet_ again. Teddy couldn’t do algebra when he was in school, much less now. And, god help him, if Teddy has to think of one more meal for that kid, he’s going to scream. When he was alone, he had survived on protein bars and take out food. Now, he’s got a growing teenage boy to think of, and Teddy’s gotta be quick on his feet and his bank account. It seems like every day, he wakes up, and every god damn day, he’s gotta think _‘what’s for dinner?’_ He goes into the grocery store, and suddenly he forgets every food he’s ever liked. He’s been making a lot of pasta and meatballs, but that’s getting old for the both of them. Honestly, the entire exercise is torturous. 

Now, Sue’s pressing him for information. He knew going to her would be a little bit of a risk, but a month into this endeavor, he had started to worry. Now, he’s got her up his ass about _suspects_ and _leads_ and _known accomplices._ Fuck if Teddy knows any of that – all Teddy knows is that Big John asked him to never tell John B about Ward, and god damn, he was going to do that. Even if it meant keeping that from the Sheriff. 

Maybe telling Sue would help the investigation. Maybe they could find out where Big John is, maybe they’d be able to catch Ward in some criminal act. 

Or, more likely, they’d point a finger at Ward, he would get off scot free because of his wealth and connections. That means Ward would wait patiently to exact his revenge, if that was ever his plan. 

Teddy isn’t willing to bet his own safety – much less John B’s – on the integrity of the criminal justice system. 

Teddy makes the decision to keep all he knows to himself. And with that decision comes the consequence of telling John B about the missing person’s report. 

“I, uh, talked to Sheriff Peterkin this weekend,” Teddy says, unprompted over breakfast that Monday morning. Breakfast is not the most lavish affair between the two boys – they hardly ever have a lavish affair. Today’s breakfast of instant oatmeal and orange juice is about as fancy as it ever gets. 

“I swear to god, JJ didn’t steal -”

“Not about JJ,” Teddy says, laughing at John B’s assumption. He pauses for a minute, thinking over John B’s statement. “Wait, what did JJ steal?”

“Nothing,” John B says too quickly. “What did you talk to Peterkin about?”

“About, uh, your old man,” Teddy says, swirling his spoon around in his oatmeal. He doesn’t know how to have a conversation like this with a kid. Teddy’s not certain, but he’s pretty sure this is the type of conversation that could permanently traumatize a kid. Teddy doesn’t want to permanently traumatize John B. 

_Damn it._ This is why Teddy never had kids. 

“Oh,” John B says, deflating a little. “What’d she have to say?”

Teddy forces himself to take a deep breath. “She’s putting out a missing person’s report. See if anyone’s heard anything.” 

“Oh, damn,” John B says, standing up from his seat. He gathers his empty oatmeal bowl and his spoon, carrying them with him when he leaves the table. “What makes her think dad is missing?” 

Teddy blinks, and then turns to watch John B head to the sink in amazement. “The fact that he hasn’t been home in two months?” Teddy says hesitantly, trying to figure out what exactly John B is thinking. They hadn’t expressly discussed their fears for Big John’s safety – Teddy isn’t big on emotional shit like that, and John B had never ventured to start the conversation himself. He hadn’t talked to John B about it, but he figured the boy would at least be a _little_ worried about his dad. His lack of fear is either admirable or nerve wracking – Teddy can’t figure out which. 

“Did you tell her he said he’d have to disappear for a while?” John B offers nonchalantly, shrugging a little. 

“Uh, yeah,” Teddy says, blinking in surprise. _Yeah,_ Teddy wants to say. _A little while._ A little while is a week or two, maybe three. A little while is not two months. “She’s just trying to figure out what happened,” Teddy tries instead, and John B stares at him. 

“What do you mean _‘what happened’_? Nothing happened! He told us he was disappearing!” John B says, opening the fridge and grabbing a water bottle. He shuts the door, turning to look at Teddy. “For once in his life, he’s doing what he said he would.”

“He didn’t say he was going to be gone for two months, John B,” Teddy says gently, but John B doesn’t seem receptive. 

“So, what? You think something happened to him?” John B prompts, and Teddy sighs. 

“I think something could have happened. He wasn’t supposed to be gone this long.” Teddy finally admits, albeit reluctantly. 

“What do you mean?! He didn’t say anything about how long he was going to be gone!”

“Yeah, well, I can’t exactly imagine he’d ask me to take two months off of work.” Teddy points out. “We’re barely scraping by as it is, John B. I don’t think he’d leave us like this.” 

John B scoffs. “Then you don’t know dad.”

“John B -”

“Look, whatever, run the report. I don’t care. When dad comes back, you can tell him you gave up on him. I gotta get to work.”

John B stalks across the Chateau, slamming the front door behind him. 

  
  


\-----------

  
  
  
  


“He’s such an asshole, Kie!” Sarah screams through the phone, and Kiara cringes as she holds it away from her ear. 

_I could have told you that months ago,_ Kiara wants to retort back, but she could tell that this was not a time for that reminder. 

“What exactly happened?” Kiara asks again, because the last three times she asked, she hadn’t gotten a straight answer. In fact, she hadn’t gotten any answer. Sarah had just kept ranting about what an asshole Dennis is. And like, Kiara can agree – she’s never liked him – but she’d also like to know _why_ Sarah suddenly had a change of heart. 

“We got into a fight,” Sarah says, and Kiara nods even though Sarah can’t see her. 

“Yeah, uh huh, got that. What, exactly, was it about?” 

Sarah sighs. “It was so stupid. He wanted me to go with him and his parents to his grandpa’s 90th birthday party.”

“Oh?” Kiara questions, because that doesn’t seem like the end of the world. 

“In _Tampa.”_

 _“Oh,”_ Kiara says, realization dawning on her. “Oh, yeah. That’s a no.” 

“Right?!” 

“He really thought Ward Cameron was about to let his fifteen year old daughter off the Island with a _boy?_ To go to _Florida?”_ Kiara says, and she scoffs. Dennis is nothing if not bold.

“Literally! Thank you!” Sarah says, and Kiara can perfectly imagine her stance even through the voice call – she’s standing in her room, one hand on her hip and the other holding the phone to her ear, occasionally waving dramatically at the wall. 

“Did you tell him your dad would send the national guard to get you if you left the island without his permission?” 

“I _tried_ to! But that boy does not listen to reason. Like, obviously my dad is going to have problems with that! Any normal parent would!” Sarah says, and Kiara can hear her flop down on her bed.

“So you told him no and he got mad?” Kiara asks, laying back in her own bed. 

“Basically! He said _‘You don’t put enough effort into this relationship’,”_ Sarah says, mimicking Dennis’s voice. “Which is such _bullshit_! I put in _at least_ as much effort as him, probably more!” 

“The emotional legwork is always on the woman -”

“Always on the woman!” Sarah repeats back. Kiara feels for Sarah – she really does – but something about Sarah’s exasperated tone is funny, and Kiara has to stop herself from laughing. She bites her lip, counts to ten, and waits for Sarah to say something else.

“Are you okay?” Kiara says after a moment of silence, and Sarah sighs loudly. 

“You know, there is one thing that would make me feel better.” 

Kiara’s already out of bed – she’s ready to do anything her best friend needs. She can be at Tanneyhill in 15 minutes if she stops for ice cream, and she already has a list of comedy movies they can watch if Sarah doesn’t want to pick her go-to rom coms. Kiara is pulling on a sock, ready to tell Sarah _‘I’ll be there before you know it’_ when Sarah speaks again. 

“Topper’s throwing a party.”

Kiara falls back onto her bed, her sock half on her foot. She stares blankly at the wall ahead of her. 

“Jesus Christ, Sarah,” Kiara says, trying not to yell. “Was that whole sob story just a ploy to get me out of the house?”

“Kiara Carrera, I would never lie to you!” Sarah says through a gasp, and Kiara rolls her eyes. “Seriously – Dennis is an asshole and I just really want to go out tonight.”

“I feel like this isn’t healthy,” Kiara points out. 

“Please?” Sarah begs, and Kiara thinks for a minute. Less than five minutes ago, she was ready to do whatever necessary to make Sarah happy. Now, Sarah’s telling her what she needs, giving her a direct path forward. Who is Kiara to judge her for wanting to feel better?

“Fine.” Kiara states, ripping the sock all the way off her foot and marching to her closet. “Fine, but you _owe_ me.”

“Oh, Kiara,” Sarah says overdramatically. “I’ll owe you for the rest of my life.”

  
  
  


\-----------

  
  
  


“What are you doing?” Kiara asks, pulling Sarah away from the crowd. “What did you have to drink?”

“Nothing, Kie, just a beer.” Sarah says, leaning out of Kiara’s grip.

“What are you doing?” Kiara restates, and Sarah shrugs.

“I’m having fun, Kiara. Geez, let me live,” Sarah sing-songs her answer. She’s joking, but Kiara is _not_.

It started when they got to the party. The party was like any other – the lacrosse players and the cheerleaders, the popular kids and the nerds they graced with an invitation. Honestly, if Sarah hadn’t emotionally blackmailed her into going, it’s the type of party Kiara would have avoided at all costs. 

At first, it was innocent. Topper had complimented Sarah’s outfit, and they started talking about the end of the lacrosse season that spring. Kiara wasn’t that surprised. Topper had about three topics he could speak about before he got bored: lacrosse, his superiority complex on the island, and his dad’s company (that he would remind everyone he’s going to inherit). The fact that Sarah was engaging with him in one of his predefined List Of Acceptable Topics didn’t actually mean much – Topper would talk to anyone who would listen about any of them. 

It started becoming less innocent when he invited her to play beer pong as his partner, and she avidly agreed. It got worse when Topper put his arm around her in the second round, and by the time they moved on to Flip Cup, Sarah had her own arms wrapped around Topper’s torso. 

"Sarah - " Kiara tries again, but Topper calls Sarah's name, reminding her that she's up next in Flip Cup.

"Oh, I'm up!" Sarah says, yanking her arm out of Kiara's grip and moving back towards the table. "Chill out, Kiara!" She yells back, throwing a stunning smile Kiara's way. 

“Alright,” Kiara relents, cause she doesn’t really know what else to say. Sarah's already basically out of earshot, anyways, given how loud the music is.

This entire experience is weird. Sarah hops back to her original spot at the table, wrapping herself around Topper. Over Topper's shoulder, Kiara can see Scarlett glaring daggers at the couple. It takes a minute, but eventually Kiara catches her eye. Scarlett rolls her eyes, throwing her hands up like _what are you gonna do?_

Kiara grabs her drink, throwing one last look at Sarah and Topper, before moving as quickly through the crowd as possible. She finally makes her way around the dance floor, nearly stumbling her way into Scarlett. 

“Woah there, Kie,” Scarlett says, catching Kiara’s arm as she nearly falls. Kiara throws a dirty look back at the Junior who had tried to run into her before turning back to Scarlett. 

“Can you explain to me what’s going on here?” Kiara asks, and Scarlett surveys the party. 

“Well, you see, this is a _party -_ ” 

“ _Scarlett.”_ Kiara sighs. “I’m not talking about the party. I’m talking about _them_.” 

Kiara sends a pointed look back at Sarah and Topper. Scarlett follows her line of sight, and shrugs. 

“I honestly couldn’t tell you,” Scarlett admits.

“She didn’t break up with Dennis, did she?” Kiara asks Scarlett, because Kiara’s not 100% sure. Sarah had never said they were broken up, but maybe Kiara was supposed to pick up on that as her best friend. 

“Nah,” Scarlett says, shaking her head and lifting her drink to her lips. “Dennis texted me early today. They are very much not broken up.” 

“But they did get into a fight?” Kiara clarifies, and Scarlett nods, her eyes wide. 

“Oh, a giant fight. But Dennis has been trying to get in contact with her all day to make amends. He had to leave with his parents, though, and she won’t pick up his calls.” 

“Not returning his calls is one thing, but _this,”_ Kiara gestures to the display of affection by the Flip Cup table. “This is a little much. Especially with Topper of all people.” 

“Do you think he knows about Dennis and Sarah?” Scarlett questions, quirking her head as she looks at the boy in question.

“You really think Topper reserves one of his very limited brain cells to remember underclassman relationships?” Kiara deadpans, and Scarlett snorts in response. 

“Alright, fair enough.” 

“He did ask her if she was single at one point.” Kiara amends, because she had been standing next to Sarah and Topper when it happened. She had silently hoped that Sarah would say _no,_ and Topper would be enough of a gentleman to back off. It was a tall ask, but Kiara still hoped.

Scarlett raises an eyebrow. “And she said?”

“ _Nothing exclusive.”_ Kiara mimics Sarah’s voice. She had visibly cringed when Sarah had said it. Kiara hadn’t ever liked Dennis, and probably never would, but something about the situation made Kiara's skin crawl. No one deserved whatever Sarah was putting Dennis through, no matter how much Kiara didn’t like them. Sarah’s actively drumming up some major negative karma, and Kiara is not here for it. Nevermind the fact that, as bad as Dennis was, Topper was at least twice as bad. She could tolerate Dennis – Topper was insufferable without a lacrosse stick. 

“Jesus Christ,” Scarlett says, turning away from the flip cup tournament. “You know I’ve been friends with Dennis since second grade?” Scarlett asks, and Kiara nods. “I know you don’t like him, but this Sarah and Dennis thing – they are two of my best friends.”

Scarlett ends the sentence looking up at the ceiling, and Kiara suddenly realizes how much this is actually affecting Scarlett. Kiara had felt vaguely uncomfortable with Sarah’s behavior, but it was mostly for Sarah’s own well being. She really wasn’t a huge fan of Dennis, and she was always very firmly on Team Sarah in every regard. She just didn’t want Sarah to do something she would regret. 

Scarlett had a whole other point of view – as someone equally close to both Sarah and Dennis, she got a front row seat to this shit show. 

“You know, like, I told him not to ask her out,” Scarlett says suddenly, like she’s admitting it for the first time, and Kiara turns to look at her. 

“Yeah?” Kiara says, her tone neutral so Scarlett won’t freak out.

“Yeah,” Scarlett says. “I told him not to ask her out, because she did the same thing to the last guy she dated. Last summer, she was with Anthony, and then she started flirting with a tourist over summer break. Broke up with him a few weeks later. Like, same exact thing. The fight, the flirting. I didn’t, you know, actually think she’d do that to Dennis. But I warned him. She always does this.”

Kiara blinks for a second. She doesn’t know what to say to Scarlett, so she just stands there, opening and closing her mouth a few times. 

She knows Scarlett isn’t lying to her, but she has a hard time believing what she’s saying – that somehow, even though they are barely out of their freshman year of high school, _Sarah Cameron_ is a serial cheater. She doesn’t know what had happened last summer – she hadn’t known Sarah then – but even now, Scarlett’s words seemed too harsh. 

Sure, the entire Topper thing leaves a bad taste in Kiara’s mouth. She definitely doesn’t agree with cheating on _anyone._ This seems like more of a gray area – Dennis and Sarah are definitely fighting, maybe Sarah even thinks they are on a break. Plus, she hasn’t actually _done_ anything with Topper, she’s just a little touchy feely. It’s not quite grounds for a character assassination. 

“Whatever,” Scarlett says after a minute. “We’ll get her home soon and I can talk to her.” 

Kiara nods at that, because she’s not really sure what else to do. 

  
  
  


\----------

  
  
  


“I’m saying, you shouldn’t be hanging around Topper like that when you’re dating Dennis!” 

“Thanks for the relationship advice, _Scarlett._ I’ll be sure to take your opinion into account for _my_ relationship!”

“It’s not just _your_ relationship! It’s all of us – we’ve been friends since second grade. You can’t fuck it up because you and Dennis are fighting!” 

“Watch me!” 

Kiara raises an eyebrow at Wheezie as she peeks her head around the corner of the kitchen. Thankfully, Ward and Rose weren’t home, or else this screaming match would have surely woken them up. When Scarlett and Sarah had started fighting on the way home, Kiara had attempted to intervene. At this point, nearly a half hour after they’d gotten back to Tanneyhill, she decided to let the fight take its course. As Scarlett and Sarah scream at each other from opposite ends of the island in the center of the kitchen, Kiara’s sitting on a stool about halfway between them, waiting for one of them to take a long enough breather for her to interrupt.

Wheezie, who was supposed to be in her room sleeping, watches the verbal tennis match with wide eyes. 

“You always do this! You cheated on Anthony, and now you’re cheating on Dennis – seriously, Sarah, what is your problem?” 

When Wheezie makes eye contact with Kiara, Kiara just shrugs. She doesn’t know what to tell the little girl except _‘I’ve already tried breaking it up’._ Wheezie nods a little, disappearing again around the corner. Kiara watches her go, kind of creeped out by how quiet she can be. If Kiara hadn’t seen her with her own two eyes, she wouldn’t have known she was ever there. 

“What’s my problem? What’s _your_ problem? Are you mad because Topper was paying attention to me?”

“Fuck off.”

“Yeah, you’re upset because the guy you have a crush on spent the entire night with me!” Sarah seethes out, and Scarlett just shakes her head. 

“Fuck you, Sarah,” Scarlett says, picking up her jacket from the counter and stomping out of the kitchen. “I’m going home!” 

“Good!” Sarah yells back. She stares angrily after Scarlett until the front door slams behind her, and then she turns her eyes on Kiara. “Can you believe her?” 

Kiara just shakes her head, because she can’t believe anything that happened tonight. Honestly, the last thing she expected was a fight between Scarlett and Sarah. 

“It’s, uh, definitely strange,” Kiara relents, and Sarah nods. 

“Oh, is it ever,” Sarah says. “Whatever. I need to shower before I go to bed.”

\----------

  
  


“Is it me?”

  
Sarah’s voice breaks through the silence of the room, and Kiara turns over in the bed to look at her. The room smells like Sarah’s shampoo – some flowery, fruity perfume. Kiara can barely make out the shape of her face in the moonlight. Sarah’s staring at the ceiling, her hands on her stomach. Kiara curls tighter into a ball next to her. 

“What?” Kiara says groggily. She had been nearly asleep – in fact, she had been certain Sarah was asleep as soon as the lights went out, given how quiet she had been. 

“Is it me?” Sarah repeats, and she turns her head to look at Kiara. “First Dennis gets pissed at me, and then Scarlett. Maybe I’m the problem.”

Kiara doesn’t know what to say to that. She doesn’t think Sarah’s the problem, but she definitely made some problematic decisions tonight. Kiara can’t think straight enough to walk the delicate line that explaining that distinction would take – her brain is muddled by sleep or a lack thereof. Instead of explaining herself, she just cuddles further into her pillow. 

“No,” Kiara sighs sleepily. “It’s not you.” 

“Are you sure?” Sarah insists, but Kiara’s too tired to respond. She just nods a little.

It’s silent for a little while longer. It’s long enough that Kiara’s almost asleep, but then Sarah wakes her up again. 

“He told me he loved me,” she blurts out, and Kiara barely cracks one eye open. 

“Hmmm?” Kiara murmurs, and Sarah sighs. 

“He told me he loved me the other day,” Sarah repeats. 

“That’s nice,” Kiara says, her voice still thick with sleep. 

“No, it’s not nice. Kiara, he _loves_ me,” Sarah insists, and Kiara shrugs her shoulders as best she can while laying down. 

“Do you love him?” Kiara says, half into her pillow. Sarah looks at her, realizing she isn’t going to get anywhere tonight with her tired best friend. 

“I don’t know,” Sarah admits. She waits until Kiara’s softly snoring, and then she stares at the ceiling. 

“I love _you_ , Kiara. You’re my best friend,” she says, and Kiara just snores in response. 

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annnnd the next chapter is: "How To Ruin The Mood With One Newspaper Article, a guide by Sheriff Peterkin"


	17. How To Ruin The Mood With One Newspaper Article, a guide by Sheriff Peterkin

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello!! 
> 
> As promised, our main girl Peterkin is off screen, but actively trying to break our hearts in this chapter. We're still not *quite* in JJ's mind yet (which I know alot of people are curious about) but Pope gives us a little bit of an insight - or maybe just more context. Hope you guys enjoy it!!
> 
> And, as always, thank you to my lovely beta lemon_drizzle_cake for all your help with this chapter, and for taking a look at my absolute disaster of an outline :)

The incessant buzzing of her cell phone isn’t what wakes Kiara up – it’s Olivia reaching over, slapping her thigh with a threat to _shut off her goddamned phone._

Kiara’s stiff and exhausted from sleeping the entire night on Sarah’s living room floor – if you could really call her constant tossing and turning to find a comfortable position _sleeping._ She’s tired enough that she has half a mind to chuck her phone into the other room and deal with the missed calls later. Her mind is foggy with sleep, and really, what could be so urgent on a lazy Tuesday morning in the summer? 

“Shit,” Kiara mumbles, as she reaches behind the couch cushion she’s using as a pillow, slapping her hand around until it hits the familiar shape of her phone. She grabs it, bringing it up to her face. Despite her better judgement, she feels just guilty enough to crack one eye open to look at the screen. The glare of the phone is too bright, but she sees _Mom_ scrawling across the top of the phone. 

_Mom_ doesn’t call often, especially when Kiara is at Sarah’s – she’s just curious enough to answer, bringing the phone up to her ear. 

“Hello?” Kiara says, her voice thick with sleep, her eyes falling back closed as she waits for her mom’s response. 

“Kiara?” her mom’s voice comes through the phone, far too clear for this early in the morning. “Kiara, hun, can you come home?” 

“What?” Kiara mumbles, sliding a hand down her face, trying to wake up enough to understand her mom. 

“Shut up, Kie,” Sarah mumbles half into her pillow, her words nearly unintelligible. 

“Kiara, I need you to come home now,” her mom says into the phone, and Kiara recognizes the familiar panic in her voice. If Kiara’s eyes were open, she’d roll them, but even that’s too much effort for seven in the morning. 

“Mom,” Kiara whines, her words slurring together with sleep. “I’m not doing anything. I’m still at Sarah’s. We’re all asleep.”

“I know, I know,” Kiara’s mom says, and Kiara’s a little shocked by the lack of hostility in Anna’s voice. Normally, even questioning her mom’s orders is enough to piss her off. “I just – please come home.”

“Am I in trouble?” Kiara questions, cause she kind of thinks she must be, given how the conversation is going, but her mom doesn’t _seem_ angry. Anna Carrera is a great actress, though.

“No! No – not at all. I’m sorry to pull you away from your friends. We just need to tell you something.”

_We just need to tell you something._

_We_ as in her parents – both of them. 

_Something_ as in something bad, given Anna’s tone. 

Kiara’s eyes snap open suddenly. “Is everything okay?”

“Yes – I mean – I think-” Anna stutters. “But we need to talk to you,” she repeats after a second, and fear clutches Kiara’s heart. 

Her mom is a perfect picture of a debutante – she doesn’t get flustered over bad news like this unless it’s _bad news._ Kiara’s mind whirls, going through the possibilities of terrible things. Both her sets of grandparents are old, but they’ve been mostly healthy as of late. She hopes that hasn’t changed. Kiara’s aunt is having a baby – she hopes something bad didn’t happen there. She runs through the list of terrible things – things that could unhinge Anna Carrera, and each one seems worse than the last. 

Kiara’s sitting up, throwing her old, ratty _Moana_ blanket off her legs. “I’ll be home in ten minutes,” Kiara says, the urgency in her voice finally matching her mom’s.

“Thank you, sweetie.” Anna’s voice sounds relieved, which just makes Kiara more nervous. 

Kiara gathers her things in record time. She zooms around the room, quietly leaping over bodies and picking up her clothes until she’s fairly certain she has most of what she came with. It doesn’t really matter, anyways – she can just get anything she leaves at Sarah’s when she comes back over. 

Speaking of Sarah…

_“Hey, Sarah,”_ Kiara whispers, shaking her best friend awake lightly. Sarah stirs a little, hums a low, aggravated note to tell Kiara she’s awake and pissed off about it. “Hey, I need to go home – my parents need me for something.”

“Right now?” Sarah grumbles out. “What about the cake thing?”

_Shit._ Kiara forgot, in her panic over the phone call, that she has plans today. Rose is supposed to take Kiara, Sarah, and Olivia to a cake tasting for Sarah’s birthday cake. Originally, Scarlett was meant to be going in Olivia’s place, but _obviously_ that isn’t going to happen. Scarlett is all but a leper in the friend group, now. Sarah is still viciously mad at her, despite Scarlett’s attempt to make amends. Scarlett’s also not the type of person to beg for forgiveness, so since Sarah rebuked her first olive branch, Scarlett hasn’t reached back out. They haven’t truly talked since the fight – in fact, even Kiara hasn’t talked to Scarlett at all. Scarlett was kind of right in her arguments, but Kiara isn’t about to point that out to Sarah. Kiara feels bad for Scarlett, and even worse whenever they cross paths in person, but that's besides the point. She likes her friendship with Sarah right where it was, thank you very much. 

“It’s an emergency,” Kiara whispers back. “I’ll be back before you guys leave – don’t worry.”

“Is everything good?” Sarah mumbles, shifting a little. 

“Yeah, I think so,” Kiara says, lying through her teeth. Sarah takes her at her word, rolling over and telling Kiara she’ll see her later. 

Kiara takes off from Tanneyhill in something akin to a dead sprint, and she bursts through her own door out of breath and vaguely frantic. 

Kiara’s parents are sitting at the kitchen table. Anna’s still in her bathrobe, her hands clutching her favorite coffee mug. Her gaze is locked on the other side of the room, but Kiara can still tell her mind is a million miles away. Her dad is sitting next to Anna, in his typical workout clothes, his face half obscured by the newspaper he’s reading. 

“Hi,” Kiara says as she tosses her things by the door, moving to sit down at the table. “I’m home.” 

Anna doesn’t give her a hard time about leaving her things by the front door – instead, she just reaches out to take Kiara’s hand as she sits down. Kiara’s eyes widen – some shit seriously must have gone down for Anna to be acting like _this._

“Thank you for coming home, sweetie,” Anna says as Mike folds the newspaper he’s reading in half. 

“No problem,” Kiara says quickly. Her leg is bouncing up and down, uncontained anxiety making her want to scream at her parents to tell her what’s going on. She tamps down on it a little, her eyes flicking between the two of them. “What’s up?”

Anna and Mike look at each other for a second. Her dad takes a deep breath – a really big one, like he doesn’t know how to phrase whatever he’s about to say, and Kiara can feel her panic increase exponentially. Whatever her dad is about to say is bad, she knows it. 

Instead of speaking, he places the newspaper down in front of her. She’s about to ask a question when a familiar face catches her attention.

Big John Routledge’s kind eyes are staring back at her from the front page. 

  
  


_Local Historian Missing At Sea_

The title grips Kiara’ attention for a second, but in all honesty, her fear fades quickly. It’s not much to worry about, in her mind - she’s just confused. Something close to 90% of John B’s life has been spent waiting for his dad to come back from a boating trip. This is not the first time Big John hasn’t been seen in a few days. It’s hardly a need for this level of panic.

“Guys, I don’t think -” She’s about to finish that sentence - _I don’t think this is a big deal -_ but her breath is cut off by the next line in the article. 

  
  


_Jonathan “Big John” Routledge has been missing for nearly two months, police officers say -_

  
  


Suddenly, Kiara can’t breath. She skims the rest of the article, catching bits and pieces of the important information -

  
  


_\- reported missing by his brother, Theodore Rutledge -_

_\- left for what was supposed to be a short boat trip -_

_\- Routledge’s son is staying with family -_

_\- police have not ruled out foul play -_

  
  
  


Kiara feels like she’s going to throw up. 

_Police have not ruled out foul play._

Kiara’s not entirely sure what that means, but she’s listened to enough true crime podcasts to try and deduce the meaning: the police believe that Big John might be dead. 

_Holy shit._

Anna comes around the table, wrapping her up in her arms and hugging her tightly, and Kiara leans into her mom’s embrace – her mind is reeling and wrapping itself around the reality that Big John is _gone._

“I’m so sorry, honey. We wanted to be the ones to tell you. You and John B were so close,” her mom says, petting Kiara’s hair.

_Were._ That one word is enough to break whatever semblance of control Kiara had on her emotions. She bursts into tears, her breath catching at the weight of everything going on. She barely hears the next words out of her dad’s mouth. 

“I know you haven’t talked to him in a while, but you should think about reaching out,” he says. The world must truly be upside down for _Mike Carrera_ to suddenly want his daughter in contact with a Pogue. 

“What happened?” Kiara manages to get out, and Mike just shrugs, looking down at the newspaper sitting between them. 

“Sounds like they don’t really know. He’s been gone for two months – he wasn’t planning on being out there that long, apparently. He only brought supplies for two or three days. There haven’t been any storms, either, so no one really knows what happened.”

This can’t be happening – not to John B. Not to her best friend. Big John’s staring up at her from the front page – a man who housed and fed her more times than she deserved, someone who helped her learn to fish and boat, her best friend’s dad. He had taken care of John B and JJ, and to an extent, her and Pope, when no one else was able to. He bought her _Moana_ when she was twelve, because the heroine looked like her. The ukulele sitting on top of her bookshelf – the one she uses to strum up new melodies and tinker with old ones – was a present from him. He had given her so much, despite having so little. 

_This can’t be happening._

The last time (or maybe one of the last times, Kiara can’t really remember anymore) that she saw Big John, he was sitting on a lawn chair in the Chateau’s backyard. He was smoking something that may or may not have been a cigarette, leaning back in his chair and smiling at the sunset. 

_“Have a good night, Kie!”_ he called out after her as she approached her mom’s idling car. His low voice seemed to travel through the air slower than the rest of the noise. _“Don’t be a stranger!”_

Now she was a stranger, staring down at his missing person’s report. 

“What about John B?” Kiara asks, shaking her head. “What happens to him?” 

Her mom’s still wrapped around her like a koala, so Kiara turns her gaze to her dad. She hopes he’ll have an answer – some answer, any answer – but Mike just shrugs. 

“I don’t know,” Mike says. “I know they’ve been trying to get in contact with his mom, so he might end up with her. I also heard Big John’s brother is staying at their house, so maybe John B will live with his uncle. No one really knows, right now.”

Kiara bites her lip to hold back a sob. Mike speaks as if John B moving to Colorado to live with his absent mother is just _something that might happen,_ not an earth shattering travesty. Actually, Kiara’s not even sure Clarise is in Colorado anymore. John B has always been just slightly more open about his mom than JJ was about his, but at this point in his life he could barely remember her. The last time John B’s mom had sent him a note, it was from an address in Colorado. 

Her mind races with the possibility of John B moving to Colorado, and she hates it. What even is the Outer Banks without John B? What is the Chateau without Big John? 

The last time she had seen Big John, she had laughed and promised not to be a stranger. 

The last time she saw John B – or rather, the last time John B saw _her –_ she had said she _hated him_ with all the venom she could muster. She doesn’t really want to count the night of the musical, because thoughts of that night still hurt her heart. 

There’s no Pogues without John B. Kiara isn’t even sure she knows who JJ and Pope are without John B – hell, she’s not sure if she knows who _she_ is without him. In the list of shitty things that have happened to the Pogues, this ranks number one. 

“You should reach out to him,” Mike says gently, reaching out to take Kiara’s other hand. 

She nods at her dad. She’s going to do it. She’s going to reach out to the Pogues. 

She just needs to figure out how. 

  
  
  


\----------

  
  
  


“Dude,” Pope says as soon as his phone is at his ear, but JJ interrupts him. 

“I know.” 

Pope can’t see JJ through the phone, but he can picture the shake of JJ’s head. 

“Did you know it was this bad?” Pope says immediately, reaching for a baseball cap. He shoves it on his head while JJ answers. 

“No.” 

That stops Pope in his tracks. “What?” His hand falls from his head as he stares blankly at the wall in front of him. 

The newspaper article came as a complete shock to Pope – the words _missing at sea_ have been spinning around his head since he read them, like a news ticker. Every few minutes, it catches his attention enough to distract him from the rest of the world. The sentiment is shared by his parents, and apparently by half the island, according to his dad. At least, the half that cared.

When Big John had disappeared two months ago, John B had said _nothing_ to make Pope think it was anything out of the ordinary. Pope hadn’t even really noticed that Big John was gone for the first month, if he’s being honest – Big John being gone from the Chateau wasn’t what he would call _shocking_. Pope had brought it up about a month ago – sometime around when Big John was reported as missing, according to the article. John B had shrugged, at the time. He blamed it on a long excursion and changed the subject. Pope hadn’t thought about it twice – it’s not the first time Big John had been missing in the last year. Now, Pope wonders if John B was willfully disillusioned, or if Uncle T was keeping something from him.

What doesn’t really add up is the fact that JJ seems as surprised by the news as he is. There’s not much that John B and JJ keep from each other, even now. The fact that JJ doesn’t seem to know anything about what’s going on makes Pope lean towards the idea that John B doesn’t either. 

“What do you mean?” JJ says, his words muffled, like he was talking through a mouth full of food. 

“How did you not know?” Pope says, opening the door to his bedroom. 

“You didn’t know either!” JJ says defensively, and Pope sighs, walking through the hallway of his house. 

“If either of us were going to know, it would have been you,” Pope points out, and JJ mumbles at that. “You seriously had no idea that Big John was reported missing? A month ago?”

“I mean,” JJ starts, and he makes an irritated noise. “Fuck, I don’t – Uncle T’s here, man! How bad could it be?”

“Apparently, pretty bad!” Pope says, entering his kitchen in search of breakfast _._

Pope had woken up, something like a half an hour ago, to his mom yelling hysterically for his dad. Her voice was so panicked he thought someone had died – and, well, maybe he wasn’t far off. He had rushed to the kitchen only to be met with the news that Big John was missing. He was in the middle of re-reading the article for the third time – trying to figure out what he missed in the last two months that made this article a surprise – when John B had texted. 

  
  


_The Pogue Lyfe T-Shirt Company_

  
  


**_John Bee Routledge_ **

_waves at rixon’s cove are wild!_

_see you in 15?_

  
  
  


Neither JJ or Pope had responded in the 15 minutes since. What do you even say to that kind of text? After that kind of article?

“Pope!” Pope’s mom hollers from the living room. “Your friend is outside!”

Pope pauses. There are only two friends who would show up on his front door at 7:30 on this particular Tuesday. One of them had already said he was at Rixon’s Cove. 

“Are you seriously in my front yard right now?” Pope deadpans into his phone, moving towards the front window. He lifts the curtain back and lo and behold, JJ’s kicking a rock across his driveway. 

“Oh, yeah,” JJ says, as he looks up from the ground to the window Pope’s staring through. He’s holding his phone to his ear with one hand and a half-eaten bagel with the other, but he still manages a three-fingered wave. Pope sees his mouth move a second before he hears the words through his speaker. “Whenever you’re ready to head to Rixon’s.” He says, before he bites into his bagel again.

“I’ll be out in a second,” Pope says, ending the call as JJ nods. Pope turns around, looking into his living room where his mom’s voice had come from. She’s seated on the couch, her eyes trained on the television in front of her. It’s playing the local news, and Pope understands his mom is doing the same thing he’s trying to do – wait for any type of information that might make everything feel normal. Behind her head, he can see JJ pacing in his driveway through the living room window. 

“Hey, ma?” Pope starts, but Mama Heyward doesn’t let him finish. 

“If you are doing anything other than going to see that poor boy, you better rethink it.” Mama Heyward says without looking away from the television. 

“I know,” Pope says, turning towards the front door. “JJ and I are headed to him right now.” 

“Bring him something to eat!” she calls after his retreating figure. Mama Heyward knows the key to comfort is food, and Pope isn’t about to argue with her. “I have some banana bread in the basket.” 

“Thanks, Ma!” Pope calls back, grabbing the banana bread on his way to the door. 

“Yo,” JJ says as Pope closes the door behind him. 

“Yo,” Pope replies, jumping down his front steps. “You ready for this?” 

“Absolutely the fuck not,” JJ says, turning and heading in the direction of the beach. Pope falls in step next to him. “What do we even say to him?”

“I don’t know,” Pope sighs. He lamely holds up the load of bread in his hands. “I’m bringing him… banana bread.” 

“Mama Heyward’s banana bread is a good start, bro,” JJ says, shrugging. 

It’s silent for a second, Pope shuffling the loaf back and forth in his hands. Finally, he can’t take the silence – he has to ask the question that’s been on his mind since he read John B’s text. 

“You think she’s going to come back?” 

His words come out quick, like he’s trying to rip off a bandaid. The thought has been floating around his head for weeks, maybe months, now. This morning, it has been in his head on spin-cycle. 

“Dude,” JJ says, “Stop it.”

“What?”

“Please tell me your mom isn’t missing too,” JJ says, and Pope has to stare at him for a second to let the words sink in. 

“No – Jesus, JJ. I’m not talking about my mom. I’m talking about Kiara.” Pope stumbles over her name like it’s a word in a foreign language, and maybe it is. Pope hasn’t said her name out loud in months – not since the Boneyard. Especially not since JJ had, mysteriously and without warning, blocked her from the group chat.

Pope woke up the morning after the musical to see JJ had blocked Kiara. He didn’t quite get it until later, when his mom put the yellow flowers in a vase and handed him the card, asking him if he wanted to keep it. 

It fell into place after that. The flowers, the familiar handwriting, the reduction of the group chat by 25% of its population. That goddamn angular heart had given it away: Kiara had sent the flowers. Or, at the very least, JJ suspected she had, and Pope was inclined to agree. 

They never talked about it, afterwards. They all took Kiara’s removal from the group chat silently and without ceremony, like if they didn’t talk about it, it never happened. Still, the incident sparked something like hope in Pope’s chest. Maybe, just maybe, Kiara could come back. She might still care. After all, she went out of her way to come see him in the musical, she brought him flowers. _Love always,_ she had written on the card. _Love always_ had to extend to John B’s dad disappearing. 

Right?

“No,” JJ says, his voice harsh all of a sudden. “Don’t get it twisted, Pope.”

“This changes things–”

“This changes nothing!” JJ snaps, face scrunched up in anger. “This is the same shit, Pope. It’s always gonna be the same shit.”

Pope flinches at the harsh words. He knows that something shifted for JJ the night at the Boneyard, he knows that was the last straw that finally broke JJ’s seemingly unwavering belief in Kiara. It was enough to make him cut off his friendship bracelets, sometime between leaving the party and meeting them at the Chateau the next morning, and very soon Pope and John B had quietly followed suit. There didn’t seem to be much of a point in keeping a reminder of Kiara on their wrists, after all. 

None of them had mentioned Kiara much after that, and yet she was still _there –_ in their group chat, in JJ’s instagram profile picture, in her lost hair bands under the bed and in the tea left the cupboards that no one would drink. She was a shadow haunting the Chateau and the Boneyard and everywhere they went until that one night in May when JJ kicked her out of the group chat. She finally really disappeared after that, no lurking in the background of all their greatest schemes – whether or not she cared.

Pope doesn’t really know why the musical, and the flowers of all things, were what finally made JJ angry enough to pull that last plug on their friendship. At the time, though, it felt like such a relief to finally let her go that Pope never questioned it too much. Now, though – now things are different.

“Nah, man,” Pope insists, “This is new shit.”

“A dad going missing? The whole town gossiping? Cops being overzealous?” JJ shakes his head. “This is the same exact shit.” 

It doesn’t feel like the same exact shit. It feels like a fissure has opened up in the fabric of the Outer Banks – like a black hole now exists where Big John used to be, and it’s pulling the entire island to its own destruction. 

Maybe that’s overdramatic. Maybe it just feels shitty. 

Whatever it is, it feels ten times worse when they come to Rixon’s Cove. John B’s perched up on a dune, his surfboard laying next to him, and his face lights up when he sees them.

There’s something very _John-B_ about it all – the puppy dog excitement, the easy set of his shoulders, the way he slides down the dune to meet them – that sets Pope’s teeth on edge. John B does not look like a guy who just got the worst news in the world. John B looks exactly like he always does, on every other normal day of his life. 

It’s so predictable that it makes Pope anxious. He was expecting some sort of sad, gloomy cloud over John B, or maybe a quiet warning that he didn’t want to talk about it. John B’s demeanor has Pope wondering if he even knows about the article. 

Which, wouldn’t that suck. The last thing JJ and Pope have any ability to do is to break that type of news to John B. That requires a certain amount of emotional delicacy that he and JJ clearly lack. Although, thinking about it, he’s not sure Uncle T has enough emotional intelligence to deliver the news, either. 

John B’s smile falls slightly when he clocks on the absence of their boards.

“What are you losers doing? The waves are calling your name and you forget your board?” John B calls out as he approaches them, a slight hint of disappointment in his voice but nothing more. In fact, he’s way, _way_ too cheery for Pope’s mood. 

JJ is the first one to break out of his stupor. “JB, you good man?” he says, taking a step forward to meet John B. 

“Yeah, man,” John B says, brushing some sand off of his shorts once he comes to a stop in front of Pope and JJ. “Now, how are you guys going to surf without a board?”

“You really want - “ JJ starts, but Pope holds out his arm to cut off that sentence.

“Are you okay?” Pope tries instead, and John B throws his hands up.

“Not you guys too!” John B says, looking at the two of them like he’s disappointed in them. “You saw the article?”

Both boys nod lightly, as if they need to tread carefully around him. Pope’s at least relieved that John B already knows about the article, if anything. But John B doesn’t seem bothered in the slightest, which is bizarre. He just breaks into a laugh, as if it’s all a joke. 

“You know, on the way here, Miss Allen stopped me and asked if I was okay. Hell, even Miss Sanders from third grade was out watering her lawn, told me to let her know if I needed anything. Can you believe that?” John B says, and Pope and JJ share a look. “Like, what the hell do I need, except a few good waves and my two best friends _with their surfboards.”_

“JB, your dad–” JJ says, and John B rolls his eyes. “The article didn’t make it sound good, bro.”

“Hey, everyone needs their fifteen seconds of fame, right?” John B says, turning around to head back up the dune to retrieve his board. 

“You want to tell me your dad disappeared for months so he could become locally famous through _The Kildare Gazette?”_ Pope challenges, and John B turns around at the top of the sand dune, his hands on his hips.

“No, he disappeared looking for a _sunken treasure_ or some shit. The fame is just a benefit.”

“Don’t you think you should be taking this just a little bit more seriously?” Pope tries again. John B’s being annoyingly nonchalant about it all.

“Nope,” he says simply, shaking his head so his long, shaggy hair flips around his face. “Nope, this is right in Big John Routledge’s book of theatrics. Honestly, I’m surprised it’s the first time he’s been declared missing at sea. Tell ya what, we’re gonna have a hell of a laugh when he gets back.” 

“Have you heard from him?” JJ asks, hoping desperately that the newspaper got it wrong and John B’s demeanor is warranted. 

John B pauses for a second and contemplates JJ’s question. “Uh, no. But don’t worry about it. I’m not.”

  
  
  
  


\---------

  
  
  


This isn’t the first time Ward Cameron has found himself in a… _sticky_ situation, but he thinks this might be the stickiest. 

The shock of the argument on the boat, and Big John hitting his head – the pure survival instinct that had kicked in when Ward threw him off the side of the boat to get rid of the evidence of whatever happened – had worn off a little. Scooter had reassured him that night, but it hadn’t done much. Ward paid Scooter a handsome fee to keep quiet, and offered him a partnership to find the gold. Ward trusted Scooter about as far as he could throw him, but he had no choice. Too late to take back the breakdown on Scooter's front porch, now Ward’s job was to keep the man loyal.

A few nights later, Ward sank the _Amy Marie._ Watched Big John’s boat fill up with water and disappear into the ocean until there wasn’t any trace of her at all. Ward couldn’t sleep that night. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw Big John looking back at him.

He hadn’t been able to sleep for weeks after the incident, and his nightmares were enough to wake Rose. Eventually, after waking up in tears one night, he broke – told her what happened, and cried harder as she tried to reassure him. 

He had taken her to the court house the next morning. She was still only his fiance at the time – someone who could still be forced to testify against him, should it come to it 

He framed the rushed wedding as an act of love, as if he couldn’t bear another second to not be married to her. He promised her the big summer wedding, the catering and the flowers, if she married him in the courthouse officially that day. Rose wasn’t a stupid woman – she knew what was happening. She had to have. She went along with it anyways. 

So, he’d put a lot on keeping this whole thing a secret: his conscience, his well being, his marriage. He had thought he got away with it, too – two months and no one had said a peep. No one had heard anything of Big John, but no one seemed to be looking. Until this morning.

Ward has read the article over and over, that last line replaying in loops in his head. 

_Police have not ruled out foul play._

He can’t know how much any of them knows – the police, or Big John’s brother, or that son of his. The picture staring up at him from the newspaper set off a fresh wave of panic, enough that he is now standing in the driveway of Big John’s house, staring at his son and his friends talking around a fire. 

He half contemplates turning around and going home – Rose for one made sure to tell him this was a terrible idea – but he has to know. He has to figure out if John B is onto him. Judging by the easy way John B is laughing with his friends Ward thinks John B might be taking the news well. He doesn’t look like a guy that thinks his dad got murdered. 

Ward shudders at the thought _._ No, he hadn’t murdered anyone – Big John had tripped. It wasn’t his fault. He just – he couldn’t deal with the legal backlash. It would have taken years. And, really, what would the point have been? He wasn’t at fault, so Big John’s family wasn’t going to get a pay out. There was no justice to be done, there was no way to bring Big John back. All there would be was years of litigation and mounting legal fees. Really, if you think about it, Ward was doing John B a favor. It would have been too messy for the both of them. 

He should leave. He should go home. Shouldn’t get involved with this kid or the investigation. He doesn’t want to look guilty. 

He ignores that, because he _has_ to know. He has to know what the kid knows. 

His feet take him up the driveway before his mind can stop him. 

“John B?” He calls out, before he can think better of it. 

The three boys sitting around the fire whip around to see him. He recognizes John B instantly, and he knows Heyward’s kid from grocery runs. The other kid must be Luke Maybank’s son, he figures.

“Oh, uh – Mr. Cameron?” John B stutters, standing up from his lawn chair and bounding across the grass in a few steps. “Hi, sir, what can I do for you? My dad’s – uh, Uncle – no one’s here.” 

“No problem, John. I was just here to check in,” Ward rocks slightly on his heels. “I saw the news article this morning. I wanted to send my condolences.”

“Oh,” John B says dumbly. “Oh, yeah. Of course. Um, thank you, Sir.” 

“It’s no problem,” Ward says automatically. It takes him a second to remember the dish in his hands. He holds it out for John B to take. “The Missus made a casserole,” Ward says as John B accepts the dish. 

“Thank you, Sir. Tell Mrs. Cameron thank you, too.” 

“No problem. Least we could do for – uh, one of our own.” Ward doesn’t miss the way Maybank’s kid rolls his eyes at the statement, and Ward tries not to feel angry at the disrespect. He’s not here to teach these boys manners – he’s here to talk to John B. “Hey, if you don’t mind me asking, when was the last time you heard from your dad?” Ward manages to get out, once he gathers the courage. 

“A few months back,” John B says, shrugging. 

“Was he just going fishing, or -”

“He was looking for the Royal Merchant,” John B says, an air of finality in his voice. Ward gets the feeling that John B has answered that question a lot, and he hates it. “He had this idea that he was going to find it.”

_More than an idea,_ Ward wants to say. _He might have actually found it._

For obvious reasons, Ward chooses a different approach. “Oh, wow. Do you know if he was any close to finding it?” 

John B shakes his head, and Ward’s body imperceptibly relaxes. “Nah,” John B says. “He had some new place to look for it, but it didn’t pan out. His research was mostly… useless.” 

It looks like it pains John B to admit it, and Ward can understand that. Ward would love to ease this kid's mind, to tell him the truth about how close his father had gotten, but that would mean crumbling his own empire. Admitting to this kid what happened – that he sat on Big John’s death for _two months_ – would cause all the trouble Ward has been trying to avoid. He has Rafe, Sarah, Wheezie, and now Rose to think about. He can’t risk his family for this kid, no matter how sad his story is. 

“That’s a shame,” Ward says, hanging his head and playing the part. “He didn’t tell anyone where he was going?”

“He told my Uncle T he was going out on an excursion. Somewhere deep in the water. Didn’t say where, though. No coordinates to track him to.” 

Ward nods as if this is all new information to him. “And it was just him? No one else who helped him with his… research?”

“Nope,” John B says, and Ward can feel the fear leave his body. “Dad was a lone wolf.”

“Shame,” Ward says. “Shame, I was wishing I could help more.”

“Nah, Mr. Cameron. Nothing you can do to help unless you can get the landlord off our back,” John B says, joking. Ward smiles for a second, but something about John B’s statement gives Ward an idea. 

“You know,” Ward starts, looking at John B. “I could use a deckhand for my boat.” 

John B's eyes light up. Ward never made good on the offer he presented to Big John about hiring John B, and it seems like now is as good a time as any. Offering the kid a regular gig on his boat is probably a little excessive, but it might be necessary.

“Oh, Mr. Cameron, I was just joking–”

“I’m not – I’m serious. I need someone who’s good with boats, motivated, good work ethic. I think you could be a good fit.” _I also need to keep an eye on you for the next few months,_ Ward thinks. _Make sure you don’t try to ruin everything._

“Mr. Cameron, I don’t know.”

“It’s the least I can do,” Ward says, with a level of sincerity that John B couldn’t possibly understand. “Please, I could use the help.”

John B looks at him, contemplating the offer for a minute. “Okay,” He finally says, and then he nods with more authority. “Yeah, okay.”

Ward nods along with him. “Good, good, good,” He says, starting to turn back to the top of the driveway where his car is parked. “Can I expect you at Tanneyhill tomorrow morning? Say, 9 o’clock?”

“Sure thing, Sir,” John B says, and Ward nods. 

“We’ll talk pay then, too. I’ll show you around the boat. Introduce you to Rose,” Ward says, backing away, and John B nods enthusiastically in response. “And if you need anything, John B, don’t hesitate to reach out.”

  
  
  


\----------

  
  


Kiara intends on following through on her word – she intends on texting the boys, or at least John B. 

She’s so close – she’s drafted text after text. Each one seems worse than the rest. What do you say to someone mourning the loss of their father? _Hey, sorry I’ve been a shitty friend! Saw your dad’s missing, that sucks. Let me know if there’s anything I can do!_

Kiara’s beyond frustrated. She contemplates calling him, but she couldn’t handle hearing his voice, or him yelling at her. She thinks about asking Pope, or even JJ, how John B is doing, but she knows they’ll see that as a cop out. She doesn’t have a good option.

She had texted Sarah after she had stopped crying. She had said she couldn’t make it to the cake tasting. Something about eating cake with the Kook Princess while Big John was missing at sea felt wrong. 

Sarah had been concerned, asking her what was wrong, and Kiara had brushed it off. She also didn’t know how to send that text: _hey, remember that guy you thought was a douchebag from the Boneyard? Yeah, his dad is missing. It’s kind of crushing my soul and I can’t get out of bed._

Instead, she gives a simpler answer: _Some family shit. It’s complicated._

Which, well, she’s not _exactly_ lying – it’s just not the family Sarah thinks she’s talking about. Up until a few months ago, the boys and Big John were as close to her as her own parents – closer, maybe, in some ways. A couple months have changed the circumstances, but it doesn’t _feel_ any less true – it just hurts more. And it _is_ complicated – that part she hadn’t lied about.

Sarah had said she understood, and they left it at that. 

So Kiara’s spent the last few hours going over it again and again in her head. She can’t reach out. Not after the Boneyard fight. Not when Big John’s been missing for months and she only found out from _The_ _Kildare Gazette._ Not when JJ’s so mad at her he’s ripped his bracelets off. Not when the last time she saw Pope was at Scarlett’s house while he was delivering groceries. Something deep and unfixable has been broken there, and she can’t hit send on any of her messages. Nothing like this can be solved over text messages. But she also can’t go see John B, because the last time she saw him they got into a screaming match, and she turned all the Pogues against her in the span of one night. She can’t go back to them. She doesn’t know how. 

So, Kiara doesn’t do anything. 

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annnnnnd next chapter will be: "Sarah Cameron’s Fortress of Trust Issues"


	18. Sarah Cameron’s Fortress of Trust Issues

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Halloween guys!!! I know I'm slightly off schedule, but I hope the contents of the chapter makes up for the delay. We're getting there, guys. 
> 
> And thank you, thank you, thank you to my lovely beta [lemon_drizzle_cake](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lemon_drizzle_cake/pseuds/lemon_drizzle_cake) for her help with this chapter!! She also just published her first Outer Banks fic that I would highly encourage you to check out. I've read it and it is amazing!!!

The best way to describe the sun beating down on JJ’s back would be _punishing._ It feels like he’s been pulling weeds in Mrs. Reed’s garden for the better part of a day, but it has probably been closer to an hour or so. Sweat is dripping down his back in rivets, and he curses himself for agreeing to work as a _gardener_ in the middle of summer. The Outer Banks have great beaches, but the sun and the humidity sometimes are enough to make JJ question his loyalty to the island. He’d give anything to be surfing right now.

As he reaches for another clump of weeds, he winces. His hands are raw from spending an hour ripping the fuckers up. He had started the endeavor with gloves, but those became too cumbersome and suffocating after a few minutes, so he quickly abandoned them near the koi pond (who the fuck has a _koi pond?)_. A few minutes later, his shirt joined them, too. 

It’s not like Mrs. Reed is around to scold him for being half naked in her garden. She hasn’t stepped a foot outside the entire time JJ has been here, the air conditioning in her mansion enough to lock her inside. Her daughter, on the other hand – a girl named Olivia that he remembers from a Boneyard party – has been outside pretty much from the second JJ got there. She’s lounging by the pool, and every couple of minutes he can feel her eyes on him. Not that he minds it, let the girl ogle. But she’s fifty feet away and hasn’t said a word to him thus far, which makes it kind of awkward. 

Olivia is surrounded by a string of friends who came over to swim. Normally, beautiful Kook girls in bikinis swimming in expensive pools would be enough to distract JJ from just about anything. With the scorching heat bearing down on him, JJ has a singular goal: get the _fuck_ out of this garden as soon as humanly possible. Not even the girls can distract him from it. 

He takes a break, sitting back on his heels and wishing he remembered to bring a water bottle. Only one more row of flowers to weed, thank fuck, and he’s golden. All he wants now is a cold shower and a nap – he’d kill for some air conditioning, but that’s not gonna happen in this lifetime. 

He settles in to attack a particularly nasty nettle, grimacing as he tugs on it. Nettles are the most vicious bastards, and they always leave his hands all itchy. He’s just moving on to the next weed when the gate to the backyard swings open again. It’s the fourth time it happens today – each followed by a new trickle of girls coming in – and JJ doesn’t even spare it a glance. 

That is, until he hears her voice. 

“J-” Kiara says, sounding shocked even to his ears. JJ sighs, and if he weren’t so tired, and hot, and _done_ with the day, he’d probably laugh. How fitting that it’s the first time he sees her in months, and he’s dirty and sweaty and literally bent over in a garden – and here she is, not a care in the world, a guest of the family he’s employed by. Honestly, it feels a little poetic.

He’s usually proud to be a Pogue, wearing his allegiance to the Cut like a badge, even if it sucks most of the time. Now, as Kiara stares down at him, it feels like he’s marring this picture-perfect Kook party with his working-class presence. 

He looks up at her, shielding his eyes from the sun with his hand. He has to admit, some part of him has wondered if she was going to show up at some point. The other Kook girls look exactly like the type who hang out around Sarah Cameron. When he took the job, he hadn’t anticipated a _pool party_ coinciding with his work, much less a pool party attended by the Kook Academy girls. As the first group of girls appeared, JJ decided that Kiara Carrera showing up today would be indisputable confirmation that the universe hates him. And, well, she’s here now.

“Um, hi,” Kiara says awkwardly. She’s gripping the strap of her beach bag with both hands, shuffling awkwardly from foot to foot. The bathing suit she has on is sinfully beautiful, her hair straightened and pushed back by a pair of sunglasses that sit high on her head. 

He gulps a little and hopes she doesn’t notice. 

“Can I help you?” he says, and he’s surprised he’s not tripping over his own words. His brain has basically ceased to function – he goes a few months without talking to Kiara, and he’s suddenly tongue tied. 

It’s not like he hasn’t seen her in a bathing suit before. There had been whole summers where he only saw her in bikinis – but this is different. And not the same kind of different as when she started wearing crop tops in the very beginning of her days at the Academy, either. 

Looking at Kiara now is like looking at one of those tilt cards. If he looks at her one way, he can see Kie, the girl he grew up with. She’s the same way she’s always been – fierce and fearless, always ready to surf or outswim one of the boys. If he tilts his head the wrong way, she’s suddenly someone he can’t recognize – a Kook girl so far out of his league, he’s lucky she’s even talking to him. She’s the type of girl who wouldn’t know what a motor was if it hit her nose, someone who has no place at the Boneyard but tries to sneak in anyway for the promise of a bad boy with good hands. Someone like the girls JJ takes to secluded corners when he doesn’t feel like being alone with his thoughts.

“I, uh, just figured I’d say hi,” she says simply. JJ knows from the look on her face and the stutter in her words that she’s been caught off guard – too shocked from seeing him to remember that they aren’t on speaking terms anymore. 

JJ’s too tired for this. Honestly, as much as he would love to give her a hard time, he’s here to work in Mrs. Reed’s garden – _not_ to start a fight with her daughter’s friends. He’s got a nice tip coming his way, and arguing with Kiara won’t make it any larger. Besides, she’s probably just trying to be polite.

So he sets his shoulders, lifts his eyes briefly to meet hers.

“Hi,” he says, his voice surprisingly even. It’s just a moment, then he’s already back to work, ripping up a string of weeds from the ground in rapid succession. 

Kiara doesn’t move, shuffling awkwardly on her feet.

“Do you – uh, do you need help?” she says, pointing lamely at the garden. JJ sighs, looking up at her as if to say _seriously?_ He may not want to fight with her, but she’s certainly testing his patience. He laughs a little as he throws a handful of nettles into the wheelbarrow he parked next to the garden. He stands up in one fluid motion, making a show of brushing his hands off before answering her. 

“Don’t worry about it. I’m getting paid to do this.”

He smirks when he realizes Kiara’s eyes are trained on his newly-acquired abs, and he feels a little less guilty for ogling her figure earlier in the conversation. Kiara clears her throat and looks up, blushing when she realizes he caught her. 

It’s at that exact second he starts to feel woozy, and he stumbles a little bit, the lack of water finally catching up with him. 

“Jesus, JJ,” Kiara says, reaching out to catch him from falling. “Are you drunk?”

It should be teasing – she says it like she’s teasing, and a year ago, he would have laughed with her. But now, she’s just another Kook girl going to a party at a pool that’s worth more than the whole of JJ’s house, and it’s no longer a joke. It’s a jab that reminds JJ what everyone on this side of the island thinks of him – that he’ll grow up to be a drunk, worthless excuse for a human being, just like his dad. He always knew the people on Figure Eight thought that about him. He never imagined that Kiara might agree with them.

He shoves her hands off his arms once he regains his balance. “I’m just dehydrated,” he spits out, barely maintaining his composure. 

“I know, I didn’t actually mean -” Kiara starts, as she begins digging through her bag. It takes her a second, but she produces a reusable water bottle, holding it out to him. “I didn’t mean anything by it, JJ. Honest.” 

JJ stares at the water bottle for a second. Despite how tempting it is, a handout from Kiara is precisely the last thing he needs right now. 

“Take the goddamn water bottle, JJ,” Kiara says, reading his mind.

She’s using her best _Mama Kie_ voice, and JJ has no choice but to take the water bottle out of her hands, knowing he’s not going to win this fight. He does desperately need the water, anyways, so much so that he downs the entire bottle in one go. 

“It’s better to sip water when you are dehydrated,” starts Kiara, but JJ just shrugs. He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand, screwing the lid back on the water bottle as she crosses her arms. Her tone is too familiar, the warning too friendly. It feels like she’s pretending things are normal between them. 

JJ has to put a stop to it immediately. 

“Thank you, Miss Carrera,” JJ says, dangling the empty water bottle between them and ignoring the way Kiara flinches at his words. Rather than look her in the eyes, he stares at the stickers on the water bottle – the one that says _Save the Turtles_ stares right back at him. “I’ll have to get back to work before Mrs. Reed gets worried I’m robbing her out of her money.” 

“JJ-” Kiara starts, but he’s not going to sit around and listen. It looks like Kiara wouldn’t even know what to say if he did. He gestures for her to take the water bottle back, and once she does, he brushes by her, narrowly avoiding stepping on the flowers while he maneuvers his way to the wheelbarrow. He’s just about to lift it up when the gate opens, and none other than Sarah Cameron walks through it. JJ scoffs at the incredible timing.

Sarah passes by him without a hint of recognition – she looks _through_ him the way all Kooks do, her eyes glazing over the space he takes up and landing on something worthy of her attention. Honestly, he’s kind of surprised Kiara doesn’t look at him the same way. 

_Yet_ , his mind reluctantly adds, as he begins walking the wheelbarrow away from the garden.

“Kie!” Sarah yells from somewhere behind him, and then, quieter. “Are you okay?”

He hears Kiara mumble something like, _“Yeah, I’m fine”_.

“Well, you look like you’ve seen a ghost.” 

JJ can still feel her eyes on his back when he turns the corner to dump the weeds in the composter. The last thing he hears Kiara say is, _“Yeah, something like that.”_

  
  
  


\---------

  
  
  


“That Maybank boy is so charming,” Olivia’s mom says when she brings lemonade out to the girls by the pool. JJ left about an hour ago, with hardly a look back her way. Kiara watched him go until she couldn’t see him anymore over the end of the fence. None of the other girls noticed. 

“Mom!” Olivia yells, rolling her eyes and shoving her mom away. “God, she’s so embarrassing.” 

“Wait,” Sarah says, turning to Kiara. “That was JJ?”

Kiara averts her eyes, nodding. She doesn’t know why she feels like she can’t tell Sarah about her and JJ’s conversation. It’s probably because she’s ashamed that JJ sees her as just another _Sarah Cameron_ now. It’s something Sarah would be offended by. 

“Uh, yeah,” Kiara says, looking back over to the garden. “Yeah, it was.” 

  
  
  


\---------

  
  
  


“... and, today, he was showing me all the stuff – the scuba gear, the jet ski. I mean, literally, Uncle T, this boat has _everything.”_

Teddy wants to tell John B to _shut the fuck up_ about Ward Cameron’s boat, but he doesn’t want to be mean. John B is so excited – it’s the realest job the kid’s ever had, and Ward is paying him decent money.

It still makes Teddy’s skin crawl. John B has been working on the boat for less than a week, getting up every morning to make it to Tanneyhill by 9 to work on a millionaire’s boat. Not just any millionaire – the singular millionaire on the entire planet that Big John had explicitly warned Teddy about. The only potential suspect in his father’s disappearance, and John B was talking about the man’s _jet ski._

Not for the first time – and not for the last time – Teddy contemplates telling John B to quit working for Ward. He did try it when John B first brought up the new working arrangement, and it nearly blew into a full scale fight when Teddy suggested it was a bad idea. 

As much as he didn’t want John B around Ward, however, Big John had also been explicit in his instructions not to let John B know about the partnership. Teddy had tried to argue with the kid, but he couldn’t come up with a good enough reason that didn’t directly tie back to Big John’s disappearance. 

Really, at the end of the day, the bottom line is that Ward offered John B a pretty sweet deal. The pay’s good, the hours flexible, and clearly John B likes the work. It sounds too good to be true – almost as if Ward was bribing the kid. It leaves a bad taste in Teddy’s mouth, but they desperately need the money, too.

Two months of odd jobs on Teddy’s part hadn’t been enough to cover all of rent and utilities, much less groceries, and Teddy’s already modest savings were quickly depleting. He had tried to find something more permanent than the shitty seasonal gigs, but as each new prospect dried up, he was reminded once again why he left the island in the first place. Kildare’s no place to build a vibrant career.

The only place with any type of work available seems to be Cameron Developments, and Teddy would eat his left foot before two Routledge boys are under the thumb of that megalomaniac. He would do anything to avoid it – including the shit show of a conversation he’s about to start. 

“I’ve been thinking about declaring your father dead.” 

Teddy isn’t known for his poise, or his sensitivity – really, as soon as the words are out his mouth, he realizes he probably should have _eased_ into it, rather than blurt it out in one breath like ripping off a band aid. Oh well, it’s out in the open now – what can you do?

John B looks up at Teddy, blinking. They haven’t talked much about the article since it was printed – when Teddy got home the paper had been thrown out, which he took as evidence enough to convince him that John B had read it. Teddy also knows that, for the most part, John B’s deep in denial about whatever happened with his dad – which makes his reaction quite reasonable. 

_“What?!”_ John B shouts, looking at Teddy with betrayal in his eyes.

Teddy sighs. He hasn’t mentioned it to John B yet, but a few days ago he made a discovery. In the months before his disappearance, Big John had taken out a small, modest life insurance policy. It wasn’t anything spectacular – his brother never had any secret stash of money he could spare to invest – but it could potentially sustain the two of them for a few years. Maybe enough to get John B through high school, if they played their cards right. Especially if Teddy picked up another job. Definitely enough to keep John B from working for Ward. 

“It’s just – John B, it’s been months,” Teddy says, looking John B in the eyes. “I don’t know how much longer we can-”

“How much longer we can, what?! Wait for Dad to get back? I’m pretty sure we can wait for more than a few months!” John B yells, nearly spilling the container of Chinese takeout he had been scarfing down only minutes before. 

“John B-”

“No! He’s coming back, T. You know it!” John B snaps, and there’s so much faith in his words that Teddy _wants_ to believe him, but he can’t. 

“John B, we can’t keep this up. I can’t get a job on this god-forsaken island, and you won’t leave your friends. We are at a stalemate. We need to move on,” Teddy says, leaning back in his chair. He knows he’s attempting to talk sense into a nearly senseless boy, but he’s gotta try. 

John B looks at him with murderous eyes. “Seriously, T? You’re just going to give up?” He scoffs, hurt, crossing his arms over his chest. “After everything we’ve all been through, this is where you give up?”

“I don’t know what to tell you kid,” Teddy says through a sigh that sounds as weary as he feels. “We can’t keep living like this. We are barely scraping by.” 

“What’s declaring Dad dead going to do?” John B throws his hands up in the air. Teddy stays quiet, moving his noodles around in his take out container. “Exactly – nothing. Look, I can get another job, and, I don’t know, talk to Ward-”

“No!” Teddy snaps, maybe a little too forcefully. “Don’t – don’t talk to that man. I don’t even like you working for him-”

“Really? How does that work, you’re worried about money but you don’t want me to take the best offer I got?” John B shakes his head. “That doesn’t make any sense.”

“John B-”

“I won’t do it.”

Teddy balks at John B’s statement. “Won’t do what?” 

“I won’t sign the papers,” John B states, his tone final. Teddy sometimes has a hard time understanding what goes through this kid’s head.

“Papers – John B, what are you talking about?”

“To declare him dead! I won’t sign them.” 

_Oh._ Teddy’s shoulders sag. This poor kid. He’s not angry at him, how could he be? He’s just a teenage boy who’s lost his dad – struggling to claim any amount of autonomy over a situation completely out of his control. It’s a helpless task, though, when he’s not even sixteen and the world is a cruel place. 

Teddy doesn’t have the energy to tell him he’s too young to sign any papers. He doesn’t have the heart to admit to John B that he has absolutely no legal say in this. No, the full weight of this decision lies on Teddy’s shoulders like an anvil. 

John B doesn’t need to know that, though, if it gives him a little bit of stability. Teddy sighs deeply, nodding a little. 

“Alright, you’re right,” Teddy relents, and John B’s face falls in surprise. “You’re right. I don’t know why I brought it up.” 

“Yeah,” John B says, still looking unsettled. “Yeah, I am.” 

  
  
  


\----------

  
  


“I’m thinking of reaching out to the boys.”

The words have been tumbling around in Kiara’s head since she walked in Sarah’s room, and yet it took almost an hour for her to get them out of her mouth. Maybe because deep down, a part of her doesn’t want to know Sarah’s opinion on the matter.

“Hmm? What boys?” Sarah asks absentmindedly. She’s completely focused on her latest mission: finalize her Pinterest board so Rose will be able to get all the right decorations for her party. “Dave?”

Kiara was more helpful an hour ago, when this endeavor began. Now, she’s taken up shop on the floor, laying down and staring at the ceiling. From her place on the bed, Sarah doesn’t see the way Kiara’s nose scrunches up. Dave stood her up for one date – there’s no way she’s reaching out to _him._

“No,” Kiara says. “No, uh, I was thinking of reaching out. To the boys. The, uh, the Pogues.” 

Kiara can practically _feel_ Sarah’s shock, even without looking. Honestly, Kiara doesn’t blame her – it’s been a while since she mentioned the Pogues, even longer since she mentioned them with any sort of positive connotation. She knows she’s springing this on Sarah out of nowhere, maybe unfairly, but she’s going crazy inside her own head.

“Is this because you saw JJ on Saturday?” Sarah says, popping her head over the side of the bed. Kiara looks up at her, shrugging and opening her mouth to answer, but Sarah doesn’t even let her start. “Kie, you don’t have to do that. You don’t have to keep feeling guilty about whatever went down with them. They had as much a hand in that as you did.” 

It’s far from the first time Kiara’s heard that. Sarah had repeated it like a mantra in the first few weeks after the fallout at the Boneyard until Kiara had almost believed it. 

“No, it’s not that,” Kiara says, raking a hand through her hair. “It’s not all that, at least. I thought – I just miss them, you know?”

Sarah seems to recoil in shock. 

“Kie, after that night…” Sarah trails off. “Are you sure it’s a good idea? They’re pretty ruthless.”

“They aren’t ruthless,” Kiara comes back defiantly, though she flinches at the reminder of their last fight. “And, that night, I was as ruthless as they were. Maybe more. I don’t know, we all made mistakes.”

“Really?” Sarah prompts, and Kiara can’t begin to decipher the look on her face.

“Yeah,” Kiara says, like she’s unsure, but then she nods with more confidence. “Yeah, you know, I was friends with them for so many years. It might not ever be the same as it was but… I miss them.”

Sarah studies her for a minute, the look on her face only becoming more and more unreadable, and Kiara is desperate to know what’s on her mind. She needs guidance from her best friend, a helping hand to navigate the emotional bear trap she’s gotten herself into.

“Kie,” Sarah says, her voice bordering on pleading. “You don’t owe them anything.”

That’s exactly the thing, though. Kiara owes those boys almost _everything_ – years of friendship and adventures and support. She owes Big John all the nights on the pull out couch, endless cups of hot chocolate and grilled cheese sandwiches she used to shove in her mouth on the way out the door to the HMS Pogue. She owes them a lot more than she’s been giving them, especially in light of Big John’s disappearance. 

But that’s not why she wants to reach out to them. This isn’t a transactional relationship - it’s not much of a relationship _at all,_ currently, but she’s definitely not doing this solely out of guilt. No, what she told Sarah is true: she misses them, and she has for a while. 

She’s still terrified that John B might end up shipped off to Colorado – or, wherever the heck it is that his mom lives, now – without her even being able to say _goodbye._ The fact that he’s working on the _My Druthers_ is the only reason she even knows for sure he’s still on the island. She has been tempted to poke around and ask Ward if he knew anything about John B’s future, but she’s not sure John B would appreciate her meddling with his boss. 

With all that simmering in the background, the fact that JJ had the audacity to called her _Miss Carrera_ in the garden made a switch flip inside Kiara. Yes, she was scared to reach out when Big John first was reported missing, but now that a little bit of the shock has worn off she’s ready. She’s no longer scared of their reactions. It’s not like she’s expecting to magically fix their friendship or anything, but at least she’d like to be on a _first name basis_ with the boys. She wants to be able to say goodbye, if that’s what it comes to. The deterioration of their friendship has gone on too long. She has to change something

  
  
  


\---------

  
  
  
  


Sarah lies on top of her bed, replaying in her head what just happened. Kiara has just left, and now that Sarah is alone with her thoughts, her uneasiness is only increasing.

It’s not the first time, recently, that Kiara has said or done something that leaves Sarah completely speechless. In fact, Kiara has been acting weird since the night Sarah fell out with Scarlett. And the more she thinks about it, the more Sarah finds herself wondering whether Kiara secretly agreed with Scarlett about the whole thing at Topper’s and was just unwilling to say anything to her face. Maybe she is being paranoid, but it feels like Kiara is keeping her distance around Sarah lately, looking at her differently than before. She ditched the cake testing with nothing past a lame text about a _family emergency –_ which Kiara never brought up again. It feels weird, like Kiara is hiding something from her. And now Kiara’s suddenly discussing a reunion with the Pogues. Sarah can see pretty clearly what’s happening here.

 _They are better friends then you’ve ever been –_ that’s what Kiara had said to the Pogues on that fateful night at the Boneyard. 

Everyone who heard Kiara knew there was no question who she was talking about – Kiara may have said _they,_ but she meant Sarah. That one statement had solidified Sarah’s place as Kiara’s best friend, and even if the fight sucked and the aftermath was even worse, Sarah held that knowledge in a special place in her heart. 

Except today, sitting on her bedroom floor, Kiara called it a _mistake._ Maybe not in so many words, but that’s the clear implication. 

Sarah doesn’t get it – she does not understand Kiara’s attachment to the boys. It’s as if Kiara had forgotten that the last time she attempted any sort of reconciliation with those lowlifes, they turned her into an emotional disaster for weeks. Sarah’s not ready to go through that again just because Kiara’s feeling guilty after seeing JJ in Olivia’s garden. It’s like Kiara _wants_ to be stuck with the Pogues. 

Sarah knows they were great friends at one point, but Kiara herself has told Sarah she’s not even sure she knows them anymore. Sarah took it to mean that their friendship was in the past. Or so Sarah thought.

It’s not like Sarah wants to police Kiara’s friends – she doesn’t even particularly care if Kiara hangs out with these boys or not. It just so happens that Kiara told Sarah, back in the beginning of their friendship, that there was enough real estate in her heart for both the Pogues and Sarah. And, at the time, she was happy to take Kiara for her word. Overtime, though, it quickly became clear that there’s only room for one or the other in her best friend’s heart. Kiara can have either the Pogues or she can have Sarah, and even though Sarah felt bad that her friend was hurting, she was happy to finally occupy that space. She didn’t think it’d be a temporary situation.

This isn’t the first time Sarah’s witnessed this scene play out. It started when her mom was ripped out of her life, and then the ensuing string of nannies and au pairs that always managed to leave Sarah behind. She’s seen her dad’s girlfriends come and go (except fucking _Rose,_ who is now almost inexplicably become her step-mother) and she’s had a revolving door of friends and boyfriends herself. It’s hard for Sarah to trust people, to trust that they will stay. Yet, when she met Kiara, she thought that maybe this time would be different. Now, though… now she’s not so sure anymore.

Maybe that’s the reason she pulls out her phone, maybe that’s why she makes the decision she does. 

  
  
  
  


**_Sarah’s 16th Birthday Bitches_ **

  
  


**_Sarah Cameron_ **

_alright y’all_

_you already know what this group chat is for_

  
  


**_Olivia Reed_ **

_woohoo!!!_

  
  


**_Scarlett Anderson_ **

_I’m sorry, was I added by accident?_

_Cause I know this isn’t your way of apologizing, Sarah_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annnnnd next chapter will be: "How To Ruin A Party, A Guide By Kiara Carerra"


	19. How To Ruin A Party, A Guide By Kiara Carerra

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so I had almost no drive to write anything all last week, and then this weekend I busted out this chapter and a few thousand words for a few WIPs. It's all about balance, kids. 
> 
> Hope you guys enjoy this chapter, and as always, a special shout out to my beta-slash-election-update-buddy, [lemon_drizzle_cake](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lemon_drizzle_cake/pseuds/lemon_drizzle_cake) , for keeping me sane and also dealing with my almost completely inability to spell Sheriff correctly (I just spelt it wrong again)

**_Kiara Carrera_ **

_Why aren’t you picking up your phone?_

_I thought your party was next weekend??? Lol_

_I’m so confused_

_I’ll be over in 15 minutes, please don’t be mad at me_

_Sarah?_

  
  


Kiara’s phone clicks to voicemail. _Again._ She swears, setting it down on her bed and staring at it for a second. She’s tempted to open her Snapchat for the hundredth, just to make sure her eyes aren’t deceiving her. She’s watched Sarah Cameron’s story five times, and each one feels less real. 

Kiara had anticipated a quiet Saturday at home, eating popcorn and watching a movie. She had not anticipated opening her phone to see Sarah’s video, panning around the whole of Tanneyhill, very clearly showing the birthday party she was having. 

_Celebrating 16 with my best friends!!_

Kiara was 100% sure that the party was supposed to be _next_ weekend. It’s not like Sarah ever sent out any invitations or anything, but Kiara had scrolled through all their text messages to find the confirmation. She wanted to make sure she wasn’t going insane. Lo and behold, all of her previous texts to Sarah prove that the party was next weekend. 

Inexplicably, the entire school seemed to get the memo that the party was moved. Everyone, that is, except Kiara. 

Kiara doesn't know what to think – maybe Sarah got the wrong dates, maybe it’s a misunderstanding – but Sarah’s not picking up her phone, or answering her texts. She’s gone radio silent even though Kiara has visual evidence that she’s on her phone. 

Kiara has no idea what that means. There’s no way Sarah’s missing all of her calls and texts, but there’s also no explanation for the silence. Sarah and Kiara aren’t fighting. Kiara was at Tanneyhill two days ago for a movie night. Nothing’s changed since then, as far as Kiara can tell.

Before she can really think about it, she’s scrolling through her phone, thumb hovering over the name _Olivia Reed._

“Hello?” Olivia answers the phone, her tone making it clear that she’s already annoyed. 

“Hey, Olivia, it’s Kie,” Kiara says, trying to keep her own tone in check. “Can you put Sarah on the phone?”

“Sarah’s busy,” Olivia says, and Kiara rolls her eyes. _Obviously._

“I need to talk to her, Olivia. I didn’t know the party was moved,” Kiara says, a little bit of a bite leaking into her words. Olivia pauses for a minute. 

“It really doesn’t matter, does it?” Olivia finally states. “You weren’t invited, anyways.” 

Kiara’s heart drops at Olivia’s words. “Olivia, I helped Sarah plan the goddamn party. Can you just put her on the phone?”

Olivia huffs, and then there’s a moment of muffled conversation. Kiara wants to scream – this would be so much easier if she could just talk to Sarah. 

“Yeah, no,” Olivia says, her voice coming back clearly after a second. “She doesn’t want to talk to you.” 

“Olivia-” Kiara starts, but she doesn’t get the chance to finish before Olivia clicks off the phone, leaving Kiara in silence. 

_Shit._

There’s a large part of Kiara that’s tempted to get dressed and march down to Tanneyhill. That way, she could talk to Sarah in person, and find out the real reason she was acting so weird out of nowhere. Kiara’s sure this is some kind of misunderstanding, but she still wants to hear it from Sarah herself. 

The other part of Kiara is scared of what she’ll find at Tanneyhill if she does show up. She doesn’t know what’s going on, but she doesn’t like it. There has been no sign of any problem between her and Sarah, and yet clearly something’s going down. 

Kiara’s become used to this particular brand of indecisiveness, and she sits on her bed for a few more minutes, staring blankly at the dark screen of her phone. She opens her phone with the intent of checking Sarah’s story again – maybe just to prove that this is all real – when she sees Scarlett has just posted an update. 

And Kiara could probably get over the rest of it, chalk it all up to some weird misunderstanding, if she wasn’t faced with the image of Scarlett at Tanneyhill, hugging Sarah and wishing her a _Happy Birthday!_

Kiara drops her phone like it burned her, staring at the wall in front of her. Scarlett, who has been all but a social pariah since her falling out with Sarah, has somehow gotten an invitation to the very party Kiara has been banned from. 

This isn’t a mistake – it can’t be. Whatever Scarlett’s intention, there’s no doubt Sarah meant for Kiara to see that picture. There’s no subtlety about it. Clear as day, Sarah is showing Kiara exactly what she thinks of her. 

A bubble of ridiculous, blinding anger rises inside her. The beginning of plan forms in her head – it’s just a fleeting thought at first. It’s not something she’d ever actually do, it’s too childish and out of character for her to really even consider. 

But, isn’t that exactly what this is? Sarah’s being childish and out of character, locking Kiara out of a party she helped plan, ignoring her texts and calls instead of talking through whatever issue they’re clearly having. She’s acting like a goddamn _toddler,_ posting pictures on social media just to spite her. 

Kiara’s not a fan of the cops, and the last thing she ever wants to do is involve them in something unnecessary. But for just a second – or maybe the last couple of months, Kiara’s not sure – her moral compass has been the tiniest bit off kilter. Things she would have never even contemplated a year ago are suddenly fair game.

Before she even knows what she’s doing, she’s picking up her phone and dialling. 

_“911, what’s your emergency?”_

Kiara blanks for a minute. What exactly is her emergency? A couple pictures on Instagram? A Snapchat story? Kiara doesn’t really know, she just knows she’s hurt and angry. She is supposed to be at Tanneyhill in exactly a week, wearing matching outfits with Olivia and Sarah, celebrating her best friend’s Sweet Sixteen. 

Now, for a reason she can’t fathom, Sarah’s having the time of her life at a party Kiara’s been barred from attending. 

_Hi, yes, my best friend is actually, wildly, a bitch who didn’t invite me to her birthday party even though we hung out a few days ago, and now I’m all alone and I don’t know what happened._

She’s pretty sure the operator would get a kick out of that. 

Kiara feels hot, angry tears fall down her face while the operator prompts her to speak again. With a shake of her head, she readies her best Anna Carrera impression. 

“Yes, excuse me?” Kiara says in a tone she hardly recognizes. “There’s a disturbance at a house down the street from me.” 

_“And what is the address of the house, ma’am?”_

Kiara contemplates it for a second before she responds. Is she really going to do this? Call the cops on Sarah’s birthday?

She only gives it a second of thought before she continues, relaying the address to the operator. She’s too deep in it to turn around. 

“ _Alright, and what kind of disturbance are you reporting?”_

“Well, I can hear music all the way down the street, and there are cars everywhere,” Kiara says, trying to come up with a convincing lie. 

“ _You said loud music?”_

“Yes, it’s so loud, it… woke the baby,” Kiara says, cringing at her own words and hoping the operator can’t hear it in her voice. 

_“It looks like you aren’t the first complaint we got about loud music from that house. We are sending a patrol car over now to check it out.”_

“Thank you,” Kiara says, mostly because it feels like the expected thing to say. She doesn’t actually feel that thankful. 

_“Alright, ma’am, is there anything else I can help you with?”_

“No, no. As long as you check on the Cameron’s, I’m fine,” Kiara lies. 

  
  
  


\---------

  
  
  


Sarah doesn’t feel particularly cruel, but she definitely doesn’t feel good. She’s been dreaming about her Sweet Sixteen for years, planning it for months, but now that it’s here, she kind of feels empty. She’s just a girl lost in a crowd of people without her best friend. 

She has Scarlett, and Olivia, and Topper, but she’s become so used to Kiara that it feels like the room is half empty now that she’s not here. Sarah’s been trying to ignore it all night, but she’s realizing it’s impossible. She’s got almost all her favorite people, a full house, and a copious amount of alcohol supplied by her brother. It should be fine, even if it’s not. 

Objectively speaking, it’s one of the best parties that Sarah’s ever been too. Rafe really went all out, and she’s pretty sure almost the entire school is in her house, or pouring into her yard. The weather’s hot, but the heat broke _just enough_ that the air in the house is breathable. The music is loud, everyone is dancing, and Sarah’s spent the whole night with Topper. She’s finally broken up with Dennis earlier today, and she doesn’t feel quite as guilty about being with Topper now. There’s almost enough going on in her house to help her forget about Kiara.

But Kiara is not going down quietly – bombarding her with incessant calls and texts. Sarah keeps ignoring them all, but the thought of them keeps taking up real estate in her mind, preventing her from truly enjoying this rager she’s throwing. 

Yet, she can’t exactly say she feels guilty about it, either. Sarah can see the writing on the wall, and she simply did what she had to do to protect herself. Kiara got too close and saw something about Sarah that she didn’t like. Sarah _knows_ it, and she’s just reacting to that. 

She had to show Kiara she’s fine without her, and if that meant moving her Sweet Sixteen a week early, so be it. Sarah needs to remind everyone – including herself – that she is fine on her own, _thank you very much._ She doesn’t _need_ anyone, and especially not Kiara who would easily drop her for the Pogues any moment. 

So it’s not like she wants to ruin her friendship with Kiara, necessarily. She just wants to create boundaries. Boundaries are healthy. She doesn’t need to be codependent on Kiara.

She keeps telling herself all of that until there are flashing blue and white lights outside of her house. She’s in the middle of a beer pong round with Topper when screams of _‘cops!’_ interrupt them. Everything turns into a blur as everyone scatters. In the chaos, Sarah loses Topper and Scarlett, and she’s standing alone in the middle of the living room when Peterkin enters the house.

Realistically, it could have been anyone. It’s the dead of summer, and each of the houses on the street are occupied. The party wasn’t exactly incognito – anyone could have called the cops on the party. 

And yet, Sarah knows it was Kiara. She’s certain of it. She knows Kiara well enough to know that it’s exactly how she’d respond. It doesn’t shock Sarah as much as it should, but it sets her blood to a boil.

  
  


\-----------

  
  


“Is there anything else, Sheriff?” Ward says, nodding at the Sheriff from across the kitchen. 

Sarah can feel the Peterkin’s eyes on her. She sits straight up in the chair, ignoring the way Rafe is slumped over next to her. The asshole didn’t even have the common decency to _sober up_ during this disaster. 

Sarah has spent the last hour being raked over the coals by Peterkin. Her dad only got home a few minutes ago – he and Rose rushed home from a dinner meeting on the mainland at the call. Rose was in tears, and Ward hasn’t looked at either of his eldest children since he came through the door. 

“I just want to make sure you realize how serious this is, Ward,” Peterkin says, and Sarah fights the urge to roll her eyes. Peterkin _keeps_ reminding them how serious this is. A part of her really wants to yell _‘we get the picture!’_ at the Sheriff, but that surely won’t get her any brownie points with her parents or the police force currently hanging in her kitchen. “You’re lucky no one was hurt. There could have been serious consequences.”

“Yes, Sheriff, I’m aware,” Ward says, placing his hands on the counter and hanging his head. “My wife and I will make sure we talk to the kids, and nothing like this will ever happen again.”

Sarah tries not to vomit at the word _wife._ Said _wife_ isn’t even sitting in the kitchen with them, suffering under the critical glare of the Sheriff. She’s upstairs with Wheezie, trying to calm her down. As if Wheezie’s the one that needs to be comforted right now – Wheezie’s not the one getting read the riot act. 

“I hope you will,” Sheriff Peterkin says, placing her hat back on her head as she moves to the door. “You know I’m just trying to look out for your family, like I look out for all the folks on the island.”

Ward nods, following Peterkin out of the kitchen. “I understand, Sheriff. This won’t happen again.” 

Sarah doesn’t like the sound of that. The party was great before Kiara ruined it. She’d like to have another one, but this doesn’t feel like the time to argue her case. Judging from the look on her father’s face, she’ll be lucky if she ever leaves the house again. 

Sarah doesn’t really pay attention to what Peterkin and her dad are saying as they leave the kitchen. For the first time since police walked into Tanneyhill, it feels like Sarah’s heartbeat is going to return back to normal. But then Ward barges back into the kitchen, his face red with anger.

“ _What the hell were you two thinking?”_ he yells, loud enough that Sarah jolts back in her seat. Rafe, for all of his bravado, is still slumped back and basically useless. Like most things in her life, Sarah will face this alone. 

“It’s just a party, Dad-”

“ _Just a party_ – Sarah, it’s not just a party! You went behind my back, brought _alcohol_ in the house–” Ward closes his eyes, his hand against his forehead. “You were supposed to have your party next week.”

Sarah shrugs. “It just got out of hand.” 

Ward looks like he’s going to shout at her again, but he takes a deep breath.

“150 people in my living room is not _out of hand,_ Sarah. That’s unacceptable. If any one of them got into an accident on their way home, we would have been done! Everything I worked for, everything Rose worked for – it would have been _over.”_

“No one got in an accident according to Peterkin,” Sarah offers, almost as a knee jerk reaction. She _knows_ he’s aware of that fact, given that Peterkin has mentioned it multiple times in the last hour. 

Ward hangs his head like Sarah is testing his patience. “ _I know no one–”_ he starts, before hastily stopping himself, taking a deep breath. “I know no one got into an accident. But you opened us up to that possibility.” 

“Look, I’m sorry, okay? I won’t do it again.” 

“Well, of course you won’t,” Ward says, looking at her like she’s crazy. “You’re grounded until – I don’t even know. You’re grounded until I decide you aren’t grounded.” 

“Dad!” 

“Don’t _Dad_ me! You put the entire family in jeopardy and lied to me, Sarah.” Sarah crosses her arms over her chest, huffing out a breath. 

“What about him?” she says, pointing a finger at her brother. “He’s just as guilty as I am.”

“Rafe is not your concern, don’t worry about him,” Ward says, looking over at Rafe, who’s all but flopped on the table. “You need to worry about yourself. Go to your room, we’ll talk about your punishment tomorrow.”

_“Dad-”_

“We’ll talk about it tomorrow,” Ward says finally, and Sarah rolls her eyes before standing up from her chair and stomping out of the kitchen. 

Sarah’s anger at Kiara only grows as she makes her way to her bedroom. Kiara didn’t just ruin her birthday when she called the cops – Kiara threatened the entire family. The consequences for the Cameron’s could have been huge if Peterkin weren’t reasonable. 

Sarah was right all along. Kiara wasn’t worth the time she spent on her. Someone who could turn so quickly on her was too flakey to be considered a real friend. 

Sarah’s glad to be rid of her. 

\---------

It’s only by dumb luck that Kiara sees Sarah walking by the Wreck. Kiara had argued with her Dad about the prospect of even coming into work today, but he insisted he needed help with the Brunch crowd. Kiara, who had fallen asleep late into last night still confused about the party, wasn’t very sympathetic to the needs of the Brunch crowd. Regardless, she found herself in an apron, standing at a table and staring blankly out the window. The couple occupying the table are taking their time going through the Brunch options, and Kiara doesn’t have the brain power to try and help them decide between _Belgian waffles_ and _eggs benedict._

She recognizes Sarah immediately – her blonde hair bopping down the street in front of the Wreck, following a boy that looks suspiciously like Topper. They’re probably headed to Brunch themselves, and she knows they won’t be coming into the Wreck. 

Kiara barely registers the look of shock on her customer’s face when she cuts them off in th middle of their order, shoving her notepad to another waitress and taking off out the door of the Wreck. Call it blind panic, but Kiara knows one thing: she needs answers _now._ And clearly, Sarah’s not going to answer her phone to give Kiara anything. 

“Sarah!” Kiara yells, running down the ramp of the Wreck before she can even really contemplate the consequences of her actions. She doesn’t even know if she wants to hear Sarah’s side of the story, but she knows she has to try. 

Sarah pauses ahead of her, hesitating just long enough to allow Kiara to catch up with her. Topper has a stupid smirk on his face, like all of this is all just a comedy to him. Kiara wants to give him a piece of her mind, but she’s stunned into silence by the look of pure annoyance on Sarah’s face. Kiara knows that look, too – it’s the _bitch face_ she puts on when she so chooses.

“What?” Sarah bites out, and the venom her tone takes Kiara by surprise, momentarily throwing her off. She jolts her chin out, pulling herself together. Readying herself for a confrontation. 

“What’s going on?” Kiara says, trying not to sound desperate. 

“Nothing’s going on, Kiara,” Sarah scoffs. “We were just going to brunch until you interrupted us.” 

“Sarah, seriously. Can you please just tell me what’s wrong?”

Sarah spares her a bored look before moving to turn away. “Nothing’s wrong, Kiara. Now, if you excuse us.” 

“Nothing’s wrong?” Kiara practically cries, trailing behind them. “Sarah, you didn’t invite me to your birthday party. You haven’t been answering my texts or phone calls all day. I can’t fix it if you don’t tell me what’s wrong.” 

Her voice sounds suspiciously like begging, but Kiara can’t even bring herself to care about saving face at this point. Sarah, however, doesn’t seem impressed as she rolls her eyes at her. 

“To be perfectly honest, I’m just over it.”

“Over _what,_ exactly? _”_

“I’m over your bullshit!” Sarah nearly shouts at her, making her recoil. She’s so loud that she catches the attention of a few tourists nearby. Topper notices, reaching out a hand to try and rein Sarah in. He’s only moderately successful. 

“You’re over _my_ bullshit?” Kiara seethes. “That’s rich, coming from you! At least I’m not treating my best friend like shit.” 

“Bold of you to call yourself my best friend,” Sarah dismisses her, and that stops Kiara in her tracks. She can’t do anything but blink back in surprise. She was expecting Sarah to say a lot of things, but she sure didn’t expect _that_.

“Oh, so now we aren’t friends?” Kiara says after she recovers from her shock. She shakes her head. “You can’t be serious.”

The truth is, she’s been Sarah’s best friend since that day at the turtle hatch, there’s no doubt about that. There was never really any competition. Honestly, even with the birthday debacle and all of Sarah’s weirdness around it, Kiara never thought they’d end up debating that simple fact. 

“I don’t know what to say, Kiara,” Sarah says smugly. “Best friends don’t call the cops on their Best Friend’s birthday party.”

It feels like a bomb just dropped. Kiara didn’t think Sarah would jump to conclusions like that, and to be honest – she isn’t ready to answer for what she did. She knew when she made that call that she would feel guilty about it for months, and she would have to live with keeping that secret from her best friend. She didn’t expect Sarah to jump on the assumption like that Sarah didn’t even give her the benefit of the doubt. She spoke the words with such certainty that it felt like she was pulling the curtain back on Kiara herself, showing her the truth. 

“Sarah -”

“That’s a bitch move, Kiara.” Sarah doesn’t let Kiara get a word in, her words sounding final. “But I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.” 

Kiara doesn’t know what to say. She can’t defend herself, and Sarah won’t even give her the chance. Sarah’s ready to drop her with less than an ounce of evidence. 

“She’s not even denying it,” Topper scoffs, reaching for Sarah’s hand. “Let’s get out of here.” 

“Yeah,” Sarah says, taking one last look at Kiara before following Topper down the street. 

\---------

Kiara feels numb for the rest of her shift at the Wreck. She can’t process what just happened – she’s never even been in a fight with Sarah. 

And yet, Kiara knows the pattern. She’s seen it play out a hundred times. If she gives it a couple weeks, Sarah will eventually come around. She has already forgiven Scarlett, after all, it’ll only be a matter of time before she does the same with Kiara. It’s not like Sarah holds a fantastic grudge. If Kiara could swallow her pride, the entire thing could blow over before school starts.

Kiara also knows that, sometimes, Sarah can be cruel, and in order to get back into her good graces, Kiara’s going to have to withstand it for a while _and then_ grovel for her forgiveness. 

Kiara loves Sarah, but this is something she won’t do. She can’t do it – it’s not who she is. At this point, Kiara barely recognizes herself in the mirror anymore. She won’t sell this part of her dignity, even if the price to pay is her friendship with Sarah. No, that type of one-sided self-sacrifice ends here.

That’s exactly what Kiara’s friendship with Sarah entailed, she now realises. Even though Sarah never asked her too, Kiara has had to sacrifice a lot just to maintain her place in Sarah’s circle. She can’t do that anymore, especially if Sarah is going to flake on her like she just did. It’s like Kiara is finally having a moment of clarity, seeing things for what they have been for a while.

The decision doesn’t feel _good,_ but it feels final.

She treks home after the end of her shift, smelling like french fries and feeling like crap. Her dad gave her a little bit of a hard time for running out of the restaurant in the middle of an order, but he backed off once he caught on to Kiara’s mood. She stalks up the stairs, throwing the door to her bedroom open. Her wall of pictures stares back at her, almost mockingly. 

Kiara approaches the wall, running her fingers over the pictures. They are mostly polaroids, snippets of Kiara’s life she stuck to the wall with scotch tape and a smile. When Kiara started it, it was mostly snaps of the Pogues– of her and her boys sitting on the hammock, or spending long days on the boat. She stuck memories of semi-dangerous campfires and surfing in the cold November water next to images of the boys at the Wreck and their Friendsgiving dinners. 

Slowly, overtime, those pictures came down to make room for Sarah and the other girls. The wall became dedicated to late nights at the football stadium and pretty dresses at school dances, a reminder of sleepovers with too much food and parties with too much alcohol. 

Kiara drags her hand along the wall until her eyes catch on a particular picture – the picture of the day Kiara and Sarah first became friends. The turtle hatching event had been – and honestly, still is – one of Kiara’s favorite memories. Everything had seemed to be falling into place then. She had her Pogues on one side and a budding friendship with none other than the Kook princess on the other. She was so _happy_ that day. 

Now, the image feels like a dagger to the heart. She and Sarah, giggling as they held the baby turtles, feels less like a fond memory and more of a reminder of how much Kiara had to lose. And somehow, stunningly, she managed to lose it all in just a few short months.

Tears start to fall from Kiara’s eyes as she rips the picture from the wall. She stares at it for a second before she throws it on the ground. As if out of instinct, she begins ripping all the other pictures down, too. Just that one isn’t enough – every single one of them needs to come down. She feels manic as she rips down the picture of her and Sarah before the Harvest fest – at the time, she thought it so pretty, she wanted to paint it. The memories of Winter Cotillion come down next. Scarlett’s pool party, countless sleepovers and breakfast dates – they all end up on the floor by her feet. She doesn’t stop until the entire wall is empty, a blank canvas for her blank life. When she’s done, a sob wracks her body.

She doesn’t feel any better, not even a little bit. The anger gone, she’s left with none of the catharsis – just emptiness. Kiara bites back another sob, falling onto her bed and trying to fight the feeling of her chest caving in on itself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annnnddd the next chapter is titled: "So, The Reckoning Is At Hand"
> 
> (special thanks to Alex for helping me pick the chapter title with absolutely zero context)


	20. So, The Reckoning Is At Hand

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Am I really about to post the 20th chapter of this??? Is this reality?? I'm kind of having an existential crisis over this. 
> 
> As always, thank you so much to my beta [lemon_drizzle_cake](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lemon_drizzle_cake/pseuds/lemon_drizzle_cake) for helping me figure out this chapter!!! Tbh, I don't know what condition this fic would be in without you. It wouldn't be good.

“John B? Did you bring in the mail with you?” Teddy calls out when he hears the front door slam. Teddy has his back turned to the living room, his focus almost entirely zeroed in on the chicken on the stove. It’s a little too early for John B to be home, but he doesn’t think much of it. Maybe Ward let him off early. 

“Uh, it’s not John B, sir,” he hears from the living room, and he turns to see John B’s best friend standing in the middle of the Chateau. “It’s JJ.”

“Hey, JJ,” Teddy says, turning back to the chicken. “What’s up, kid? John B’s probably not gonna be back for another forty five minutes or so.”

“I’m, uh, not here to see John B,” JJ says, taking his hat off and running a hand through his hair. “I actually wanted to talk to you.”

Teddy’s surprised, considering JJ isn’t exactly warm and fuzzy with him. Big John used to talk about JJ like his other son, and John B certainly treats him more like a brother than anything else. The same familial ease that always tied those three together didn’t extend to Teddy, though. 

“Oh yeah?” Teddy turns around this time, giving the kid his full attention. “What’s on your mind?”

JJ’s fidgeting with his hat in his hands, eyes switching around the room. “I, uh, just wanted to ask you about Big John.”  
JJ’s voice catches a little on the name, but his eyes finally meet Teddy’s. He doesn’t miss the way JJ takes an almost imperceptible step back as Teddy moves to lean against the counter. He sighs, running a hand through his air, and he makes sure to maintain his distance.

“What do you want to know?” he asks. 

JJ squares his shoulders, looking at him out of the corner of his eye. Big John had mentioned, at some point, that JJ’s dad was _‘a massive dickhead’_ andTeddy thinks he knows exactly what Big John meant. He places both his hands on the counter, in full view, and schools his posture into the most unthreatening look he can manage.

“I read the article. You know, from a few weeks back,” JJ says, and Teddy nods. He figures that everyone in Kildare has read the article by now. In the weeks since the _Kildare Gazette_ ran it, it had become the best kindling for island gossip. “And I know that Peterkin doesn’t think it looks good. But JB…” 

“John B doesn’t believe it,” Teddy finishes, crossing his arms and bowing his head. “Yeah, I know.” 

“How bad is it, really?” 

JJ sounds like he doesn’t actually want to know the answer, like he’s bracing for impact. Teddy’s not sure how to handle him – hell, he’s not even sure how to handle John B – but he’s not going to lie to the kid. Maybe it’d make JJ feel better in the short term, but that’s not going to help him come to terms with reality. Honestly, one disillusioned teenage boy is enough for Teddy – he can’t handle two.

“Pretty bad. I mean, no contact for two months. That’s enough to concern the Sheriff,” Teddy says, trying to keep his voice gentle even though his words are harsh. “Enough to concern me, too.” 

“What do you think happened?”

Teddy shakes his head, staring at the ceiling. That’s the four hundred million dollar question. 

“If only I knew, kid. If only I knew.” 

JJ nods at that, like he’s taking the information in. He’s silent for another second, fiddling with his hat again. “But, like, do you have a theory?”

“Honestly?” Teddy starts with a scoff. “I don’t. I just think something happened. Something has to have happened, or he would have sent word back. He wouldn’t just leave John B like this.” 

JJ recoils at his words. He blinks his eyes a couple times rapidly, looking up at him again. “Do you think–” 

The question dies on JJ’s lips, but Teddy knows what he was implying. 

“It’s been two months,” he says, as gently as he can. “If he were out there to contact us, he would have.” 

JJ takes in a shuddering breath at that, nodding his head. “Alright. I just wanted to know.” 

“I wish I could tell you something different.” 

“Yeah,” JJ says absentmindedly as he places his hat back on his head. “Me too.” 

“You’re always welcome to stay for dinner,” Teddy says, turning back to tend to the chicken. “Or the night. You know, John B could use friends right now.” 

“Yeah, yeah, of course,” JJ says. “I’m just – I’m gonna go hang out on the hammock, until he gets here.”

Teddy nods at that, watching as the kid walks to the front door. Teddy sees his shoulders slump, and if he was better at this whole emotional labor thing, he’d probably follow the boy outside and try to talk feelings or something. Teddy’s not, so he lets the kid collapse on the hammock. 

Teddy knows JJ has been more distant since he got to the Chateau. John B talked about it as if JJ slept over at the Chateau most nights, yet the kid’s hardly ever around. Teddy doesn’t know if that’s on his account. He’d like to think not, but he knows these things can be complicated. He really hopes he and JJ can get over it, though. The Routledges need all the help they can get at the moment and for some reason – despite the fact that he’s the most notorious troublemaker on the island – JJ seems to be the best suited at holding John B together. 

  
  


\----------

  
  


The waves aren’t exactly menacing, but they don’t look kind. 

Kiara’s been surfing for the majority of her life. Her dad had brought her out for a lesson before she was even truly capable of forming memories. That, coupled with the influence of the Pogues, meant she has been a recurring presence at Rixon’s, the Boneyard, or wherever the best waves were. 

Kiara can count on one hand the number of times she’s dusted off her board and gone surfing in the last year. It’s not that she didn’t want to, or that she grew out of it. Sarah Cameron just wasn’t the surfing type. Sarah didn’t even own a surfboard. She was in possession of a stand up paddleboard, which she would use on a rare occasion when she deemed the water calm enough.And for the past year, where Sarah went, Kiara followed. 

Now, Kiara’s looking out onto the waves with the beginning of a knot forming in her stomach. It’s been so long since she surfed that the prospect of it sounds daunting. And it’s annoying – standing with her board, staring at the waves, and feeling _intimidated_. It’s something that hasn’t happened to her since the early days of her lessons with her father. Not even that day when JJ almost drowned had left her with as much apprehension as she has now – and that’s saying something. They might say surfing is like riding a bike, but the waves look intimidating as fuck from shore. 

She shouldn’t be doing this alone. Her first time back on her board shouldn’t be a solo adventure, but she didn’t know who to invite. Sarah, the Pogues, all of her casual friends from either the Academy or the Cut – she’s done something to piss off or drive away each and everyone of them. She almost asked her father, before he left for the Wreck. He would have agreed, too. Probably enthusiastically, and now she wouldn’t be facing the water alone. But she knew she couldn’t do it – both him and her mother can sense something is going on between her and Sarah, although neither of them have broached the subject yet. The last thing she wants to do is give them any reason to ask her for more details. She can’t explain the last few weeks to herself, much less anyone else. 

So, here she is, by herself. It’s been a while since she’s done anything by herself, and the moderate amount of danger feels fleeting compared to the relief of doing something she recognizes herself in. 

She takes one deep breath, and then another. It feels like a herculean effort to take the first step, but as she marches down the warm sand, it becomes easier. Her momentum carries her into the water, and then up to her knees, and then deep enough that she can drop her board and begin to paddle out. She only hesitates a little at the very last moment before she hops on her board. It feels like a decision – to try and risk an epic failure, or to go back to shore and wait for something safer. 

There’s really no decision to be made. 

She’s paddling out without a glance back at the shore. A particularly big wave hits her board, nearly toppling her, spraying salt water in her face and hair. She sputters at the taste, moving a few loose pieces of hair out of her eyes. It’s been a while since she’s let her hair hang in it’s natural curls – she forgot how difficult it could be to tie back. 

Despite the minor hiccup, she persists, eventually making it out beyond the break with no major casualties. The water’s calm for a rare moment, and she takes a deep breath and lifts herself up to a seated position. Her heart is pounding with anticipation and maybe the remnants of fear, and any attempt to calm her breathing doesn’t seem to have the desired effect. 

She could turn right around, aim her board to shore with the next big wave, and be done with it, but Kiara hesitates. She allows herself a moment to breath, to look out onto the ocean and the beach and the island. 

It’s too early for tourists, the sun having just broken out over the water. It’s the best time to surf, with the golden hue of the sunrise reflecting off the water, but only the locals know that. 

She missed this a lot more than she thought she did. 

Slowly, but in shocking volume, Kiara’s realizing how much she gave up as penance for her friendship with Sarah Cameron. There’s obvious things – she gave up surfing, and a lot of her activism. The most obvious of all, of course, is that she’s as good as dead to the Pogues. 

Maybe the more terrifying reality is how much farther Kiara was willing to go to sit next to Sarah at lunch. Across the water, down past the end of the beach, the mansions of Figure Eight rise above the dunes. While with Sarah, Kiara had daydreamed herself the owner of one of those houses. She wanted to go to the same college, join a sorority together and get a degree in something inconsequential. She pictured herself marrying some eligible bachelor, moving into a house down the street from Sarah, becoming a prominent member of the Island Club. She might not have actively wanted it, but she was on track to be an angry trophy wife with an angrier husband, an alcohol problem, and 2.5 kids that would grow up to hate her. 

Maybe Sarah never explicitly asked her to accept this future as her reality, maybe she never asked Kiara to give up anything for her, but that didn’t really matter. Kiara was willing to sell little bits of herself and her future without a second thought. She was only too willing to comply with the unspoken demands, and for that Kiara’s not sure if she can ever forgive herself. Her own ideals were forgotten in exchange for a comfortable, if unhappy, future. 

Kiara knows that’s not what she really wants, though. Kiara never wanted the McMansions on the beach or brunches at an overpriced restaurant. What she wants is to travel the world on a shoestring budget and a prayer, racking up stamps on her passports and memories for a lifetime. She wants adventures in places she’s never heard of, places where no one has heard of the Outer Banks. She wants something bigger than a small island rivalry and fancy parties at a golf club. 

In the end the truth is, Kiara wants a future Sarah can’t, and won’t, give her. For that matter, no one can give her that future – not her parents, not the Pogues. No one but Kiara is capable of manifesting that reality. It’s entirely in her hands. 

She takes a deep breath, turning her board away from the houses on Figure Eight, starting to head back to the shore. The water’s unnaturally calm, without a wave in sight, and for a moment Kiara’s stranded out alone with her thoughts. 

She absent mindedly reaches up to her neck, going to fiddle with her necklace, a habit she had formed since Sarah had given her the pendant back in November. This morning, she left it in a pile on her dresser, like she has every morning since their fight outside of the Wreck. She doesn’t quite have the resolve to throw it out yet, but she’s almost there. 

There’s a certain irony in how this situation with the pendent is now mirroring the friendship bracelets heartache she went through with the Pogues, but it’s also quite different. There’s a level of injustice to the demise of Sarah and Kiara’s friendship that makes it slightly easier for Kiara to swallow. It’s not easy, per se – more often than not, Kiara will turn around to tell Sarah a joke, and she won’t be there. She’s almost sent Sarah a handful of Tik Toks, before she remembers that they’ve all but blocked each other’s numbers. It comes and it goes, and it sucks, but it’s different. With the Pogues, Kiara was consumed with guilt. Instead, Kiara’s grief over losing Sarah is tinged with anger. Both sit heavy in her stomach, either way. 

If she looks the other way, about three quarters of a mile down the beach the mansions of Figure Eight give way to the shoebox houses and fishing shacks where Kiara spent most of her childhood. If she tries hard enough, she can conjure up a memory for almost any landmark on that side of the island. Staring at the Cut makes it feel like the hardest part of losing Sarah is acknowledging all she gave up for something that wasn’t even worth it. 

The sunlight reflecting off one of the windows blinds her for a second. She blinks, shielding her eyes from the light, and turns to face the shore. Time to get her ass in gear and catch a wave, or at this rate, she will miss all the best swells. 

When she commits to it, it happens almost too quickly – she turns her board forward, and within a matter of seconds, the perfect wave is approaching her. As if by muscle memory, she’s paddling to catch it, trying to find her balance and her rhythm. 

She _feels_ it when the wave catches the board, and she tries not to let her excitement shake her focus. When she’s stable, she jumps up tentatively on her feet, still using her hands to balance. She gives it another second before she takes her hands off the board, straightens so she’s standing, the board steady beneath her, and she lets out a little cheer as she hurtles towards shore. _She’s still got it!_

Until she doesn’t. With a little too much enthusiasm, her balance isn’t perfect, and about halfway to shore, she tumbles backwards off her board. She plunges underwater, and for a second, she can’t tell up from down or left from right. It’s complete chaos, her surfing leash pulling violently on her leg and limbs flailing in the water. Then, her head breaks the surface again, and her board stops moving, and it’s all calm. 

And Kiara laughs, her giggles breaking out over the mostly silent ocean. Despite the fact that she fell off, that was _fun._ She’s completely drenched, with water up her nose and in her ears, and she wants to do it all again about a million more times. 

With a quick tug, her board comes sailing back towards her, and she’s able to hoist herself back on top. Another wave tries to topple her, but Kiara just laughs, paddling her way back to the break. Maybe everything’s changed, but at least she has this. 

  
  


\---------

  
  
  


“I was thinking about doing something this weekend,” Topper says, picking at the leftover fries in his basket. “There’s a music festival happening in Carolina Beach we could check out.”

Sarah groans, shoving her fork around in her salad. “I’m on house arrest still, Top,” She reminds him. 

Topper gestures around them, obviously pointing out the fact that they aren’t currently at Tanneyhill. 

“Ward trusts me,” Topper says, shrugging his shoulders. “I’m from a _stand up family_.” 

He’s mocking her dad’s words, but for whatever reason, it’s the truth. Ward does trust Topper, as far as Sarah can tell. For the last week or so, Sarah’s only been allowed out of the house with Topper. 

She doesn’t know how that became a term of her punishment, but it had. When her dad said she was grounded, he said she was grounded _indefinitely._ She had texted Topper that night, ranting about the injustice of it all. The next morning, he showed up unannounced to take her to a birthday brunch. Sarah had expected Ward to blow a gasket, to throw Topper out of the house and lock her back in her room, but he had nearly immediately relented. Since then, Topper had been showing up now and then, offering Sarah a small escape from her sentence. Like this afternoon, when he showed up and told Ward that they were going out for lunch.

“Burgers at Bobby’s is one thing. He’s not going to let me go all the way to Carolina Beach for a music festival,” Sarah reminds him. Topper looks disappointed, but he nods. It’s not the first time Sarah’s had to shoot down one of his ideas. 

Part of Sarah knows that Topper just wants to show off their relationship, and she’s mostly okay with that. Sarah doesn’t mind being shown off. In fact, she kind of likes it. 

Topper’s always been around, just another one of Rafe’s friends, and Sarah’s usually ignored him. Sarah had learned long ago that Rafe’s friends weren’t her favorite people. Yet Topper still gave her the time of day, still flirted with her when he came over the house, dropped a comment about how nice she looked at Midsummer’s. At first, she dismissed it. She figured Topper was either being polite or trying to get under her skin, even if she wasn’t sure which. Topper was the youngest out of Rafe’s friends, the closest in age to Sarah, and she always saw that as the excuse for him to be so friendly with her. Eventually, though, it became clear that Topper might _actually_ have a thing for her, and Sarah liked that. She liked the attention, and the way he sometimes pushed the boundaries of their tentative friendship, wrapping an arm around her shoulder or getting closer when they danced at parties. 

Still, though, she shot him down everytime. She never seriously put thought into dating him even if she liked the attention. And then she started dating Dennis, and Topper became a distant thought in her head. 

He must have gotten the message, or understood that Sarah was interested in someone else, because in the last few months, Topper stopped trying so hard with her. She didn’t really notice, at the time, because she had Dennis, but there was a clear change in their relationship. 

Then Dennis started demanding things from her. He wanted to introduce her to his parents, his grandparents, his small army of aunts and uncles. He wanted to meet her parents, he wanted to hang out with the family on Sunday afternoons. All the things that made it feel like their relationship was really, really serious. 

Then, he said _I love you._

Sarah felt like she was losing control. She couldn’t reel Dennis in, couldn't explain to him why the seriousness of their relationship scared her. No one else seemed to understand – even Kiara, who was never a fan of Dennis in the first place, didn’t see a problem in the escalation of their relationship. Everyone else gushed about how sweet Dennis was, and how lucky Sarah was, and how perfect they were together. 

When Topper put his arm around her at that party, it was the first time Sarah had felt in control in weeks. He had been flirting with her for god knows how long with no real goal in sight. She could tell him to fuck off, and he would, or she could lean into his embrace and they would play beer pong all night. There were no expectations. 

When he asked her _‘are you single?’,_ she’s pretty sure he knew the answer, and she’s pretty sure he didn’t care. It was less a question of fact, and more a questions of feeling. Maybe Topper had known about Dennis, maybe he didn’t. Sarah’s still not quite sure. All she knows is that, if she had said _‘no’,_ Topper would have left her alone. He would have taken the hint, unwound his arm from her shoulders and found another girl, just like he always had. 

If she had said ‘ _yes’,_ she would have been lying. At least at that time, her and Dennis were still technically together, though Sarah had all but decided that their relationship was over. 

So, she went for the middle ground. _Nothing serious._ Something Topper could believe and she wouldn’t feel that guilty about. Maybe she should have been truthful, or maybe she should have broken up with Dennis a while ago, but what did it really matter? Her and Topper were inevitable, and here she was, sitting across from him. 

When she looks up at him, he’s staring at her like he’s expecting an answer, and Sarah realizes he must have asked her a question she didn’t hear. 

“Sorry, what?” Sarah says, trying to remember what they were even talking about. 

“What about a movie night?” he repeats. “I’m sure Ward won’t mind if we take over the movie theater tonight.”

Sarah nods at that, because it’s something her dad _will_ allow. It’s also uncomplicated, because a movie night means not a lot of talking, and her dad will have an eagle eye on them the entire time. So far, Topper’s uncomplicated. He doesn’t ask difficult questions or expect too much from her. He likes her because he thinks she’s hot and because she giggles at the right jokes. He’s attractive and funny, and since becoming friends with Rafe years ago, he’s always been around.

Maybe Sarah doesn’t need a whirlwind romance, or a ride-or-die friendship, or any grand adventure. Maybe she just needs someone who’s always going to be around. 

\----------

  
  


When Kiara’s mom asked her to pick up a loaf of bread and a dozen eggs, she was tempted to argue. She hasn’t left the house much since the party, so even a little grocery run feels like a risk. She would have argued, but something in Anna’s tone made it pretty clear that it was less of a request and more of a demand. It was a pretty harmless task, until she ran into Rafe Cameron in the baked goods aisle, the most recent manifestation of that special brand of bad luck that has become the only constant in her life. 

“What are you doing here, Snitch?”

His angry voice startles her out of her internal debate between white and wheat bread. Even with her back turned towards him, Kiara knows exactly who it is. 

“I’m minding my own fucking business,” Kiara spits out, turning around to face Rafe. “You should try it sometime.” 

“Ah, the Rat’s got a tongue on her,” Rafe mocks her, and Kiara grimaces at his sickening grin. 

“Don’t call me that.” She tries her best to come off as menacing, but it doesn’t seem to work. 

Rafe takes one step towards her, getting a little too close for comfort. “Make me,” he says, and Kiara recoils in disgust.

Rafe is far from the first person to call her a _Rat_ or a _Snitch_ since the party. Kiara has basically locked herself in her room for the last couple of weeks, but that hasn’t shielded her from the shitstorm on Instagram and Twitter. Apparently, shutting down the biggest party of the year did not endear her to her fellow classmates, who would have guessed. 

Not that any of them had any actual proof that she called the cops. Sarah just assumed it was her, and the rest of the school accepted it without question. It made Kiara’s blood boil, even if the assumption was true. No one knew, but no one bothered to ask – not even Sarah. 

Still, Rafe _is_ the first to accuse her to her face – and it’s honestly pretty intimidating. Fuck her mom’s grocery list, Kiara decides she doesn’t have to put up with this bullshit.

She turns on her heels, ready to get out of the store as quickly as possible, only to run directly into JJ Maybank’s chest just round the corner of the aisle. 

_Fucking great,_ she thinks. The last thing she needs is for JJ to team up with Rafe on the one thing they can both agree on: hating Kiara Carrera. 

But, to her surprise, when she looks up at JJ he’s not glaring at her. His eyes are hard, but they are trained over her head, directly at Rafe. She doesn’t know how long JJ’s been standing there, or how much he’s heard, but the look on his face is clear as day.

“Why don’t you get the fuck out of here?” JJ says, his tone cold. 

Despite him glaring at Rafe, Kiara can’t really exclude the possibility that JJ’s talking to her, telling her to _fuck off._ Whatever it is, Kiara’s not sticking around to figure it out, and without so much as a second thought, she bolts around JJ and makes a beeline for the door. 

She makes it part of the way down the street before JJ catches up with her. 

“Did I just break up a lover's quarrel or something?” he yells at her back, and Kiara sighs. She still hasn’t had time to process the last interaction, much less prepare for whatever conversation she and JJ are about to have. 

“God, no, JJ.” She turns around to look at him, only to find him a few feet away – hands in his pockets and an expectant look on his face. Like he’s waiting for an actual answer – as if he didn’t already know. “No! No, Rafe and I aren’t – Jesus Christ, I need to bathe in holy water.” 

“Then what the fuck was that?” JJ asks, pointing a finger over his shoulder, back towards the grocery store. Kiara can just make out Rafe’s figure heading in the opposite direction, and can’t help but let out a little sigh of relief.

The thing is, Kiara doesn’t know how to answer. She owes JJ a lot of things, least of all an explanation of what he just witnessed, but Kiara can’t bring herself to do it. Losing Sarah might not be as painful as losing him and the Pogues, but it’s a different kind of pain. It’s fresher, and more isolating now that she has no one around her to lift her up. She’s still trying to work through it all herself. 

When it’s clear Kiara’s not going to answer, JJ breathes out a humorless laugh, turning his head away from Kiara as if he can’t believe she has the audacity to stay silent. When he looks back at her, his gaze seems almost too intense. 

“Are you going to tell Sarah about this shit?” 

Kiara can’t help herself as she snorts at JJ’s question – yeah, okay, telling Sarah would turn out well. Kiara is halfway certain that the news of Sarah’s Sweet Sixteen had made it to the Cut, given it’s ubiquitousness on Figure Eight, but judging by the way JJ’s acting, she’s not so sure anymore. And, if he doesn’t know, of course JJ would assume Kiara would tell her best friend about the weird encounter she had with her older brother. 

“Yeah,” is all Kiara says, because she can’t even begin to explain it to him. He already thinks so low of her, she can’t imagine how far his opinion would tank if he knew the truth. If he knew that she ruined her best friend’s birthday party by calling the cops on her because she hadn’t been invited. Even JJ – who, as a rule, is not a huge fan of birthday celebrations – wouldn’t be able to look past that. If JJ looked her in the eyes right now and called her a _Rat,_ she’s pretty sure she’d break down into tears right there in the middle of the sidewalk. 

“Some fucking friends you have, Kie,” JJ spits out angrily. 

“JJ-” Kiara starts, but the next sentence dies in her throat. _I don’t have any more friends._ It’s a sad but true reality. Without the Pogues, and without Sarah, Kiara’s an island all alone. 

“Whatever,” JJ says, unintentionally deciding for her that the conversation will have to wait for another day. “Just look out for yourself.” 

He’s gone before she can say anything else, turning his back to her and heading down the street. Kiara is left staring at his retreating back, alone with her feelings. Seeing him again stirs back old guilt, confusion and hurt.

Only a few weeks ago Kiara had thought about reaching out to the boys. It seems impossible now, but at that point, she had felt ready to weather any storm. If reaching out to the boys had turned into a disaster, she still would have had Sarah to rely on, to get the pieces of her back together. And if by some miracle it had gone well, she would have just gone back to having an extended group of friends in her life. She hadn’t managed it well before, but she was sure she could change that given a second chance. 

She’s not sure that’s even a possibility,now. Without Sarah’s support, she’s completely untethered. Her life has been increasingly unstable in the last few weeks, and adding a random new variable to the mix seems like a terrible idea. She’s not ready for whatever conversation she’ll need to have with the boys. 

And yet… Watching JJ walk away from her now, she’s not sure she’ll ever be able to handle that conversation, but she’s also not sure there’s any real way she can avoid it. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annnnnd the next chapter is: "Kiara Carrera Has A Horrible Idea, and You Can Guess How It Goes"


	21. Kiara Carrera Has A Horrible Idea, and You Can Guess How It Goes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this fic is legally allowed to drink. someone sedate me. i have no words.
> 
> Also, I want to thank everyone who voted for PLTC in the [Jiara Fanfiction Awards](https://jiarafanfictionawards.tumblr.com/)!! I still can't really believe it won, tbh. If you haven't already, I *highly* recommend checking out all the fics that were nominated - there are some insanely talented authors in this fandom.
> 
> As always, thank you so much to my lovely beta [lemon_drizzle_cake](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lemon_drizzle_cake/pseuds/lemon_drizzle_cake) for helping me with this chapter and reminiscing on all the times we definitely did not fall asleep in bathtubs.

Kiara would like to say that the party was a bad idea in hindsight, but honestly, it was a bad idea in foresight as well. Standing in front of Max Smith’s house feels more like a death sentence than a fun Saturday night, but that doesn’t stop Kiara from marching her way up to the front door. Kiara _knows_ it’s going to be terrible. And yet she also knows she doesn’t have many other options. 

After a few weeks of isolation, Kiara couldn’t spend another weekend at home, moping around and watching reruns of _The Office_ with her parents. Her life has become a hum-drum schedule of shifts at the Wreck and binging Netflix shows in her pajamas. Her bank account is loving it, but her sanity is not. It’s getting to the point that she’s craving any type of interaction with people her own age. 

So, when she had seen Max’s snapchat story promising an _open invitation_ to his house party, she barely thought it through. She was pretty sure the open invitation didn’t extend to her, and she was also pretty sure she couldn’t give a shit. She had gotten out of bed, got dressed, and left her parents with hardly any explanation. Honestly, she had barely given herself an explanation. She just needed to get out of the house and do something halfway normal.

Kiara shoves the front door of Max’s house open, almost hitting some Junior girl in the head. The girl – Kiara’s not sure of her name – shoots Kiara a dirty look that doesn’t linger. Kiara mutters out an apology, but within seconds the girl is already moving on, walking away from the door and gossiping with her group of friends. 

Kiara takes that as a good sign. She hopes that by the time school starts, everyone will have forgotten about Sarah’s birthday party. The comments on social media have already started to die down, as far as Kiara can tell from the few times she’s ventured onto any of her accounts. The fact that that girl, whoever she might be, hasn’t called her _Snitch_ feels like a good sign. The bar is so low it might as well be in hell, but it’s all Kiara can hope for. 

Kiara may not be friends with Sarah anymore, and she may have no plans of salvaging the relationships she used to have with the Kook Princesses, but she still needs to find some way to survive the rest of high school. With the start of the school year in just a few weeks, she is desperate to find a way to make her life not completely miserable. She knows most of the popular kids now hate her, but there’s gotta be some sect of Kook Academy kids who don’t care about Sarah’s birthday party or the fact that Kiara crashed it with a police force. Maybe Max’s party isn’t the best setting to find that group of people, but it’s one of the only cards in Kiara’s hands. 

The blossom of hope dies in her heart as soon as she stumbles into Sarah in the kitchen. A drink or two in, and Kiara had sort of deluded herself into thinking that they would be able to avoid each other. Max’s parties weren’t Sarah’s scene, but they are Topper’s, unfortunately, and these days, wherever Topper goes Sarah follows.

Sarah’s face looks shocked for a second, only to turn into a scowl as Kiara grabs a bottle of vodka on the counter. 

“Bold of you to show up here,” Sarah says in way of greeting, reaching for one of the cans of hard seltzers that had been unceremoniously dropped on the island.

“Bold of you to think it’s any of your business,” Kiara says, pouring maybe a little too much vodka into her cup. There’s a shot glass a few inches away that Kiara could have used to be more sure of what she was putting into her body, but she doesn’t find herself caring all that much. She kind of feels like Sandra Lee in the _2 Shots Of Vodka_ vine, but that’s another thing she can’t bring herself to care about.

“You gonna call the cops on this one too? Or is that only for parties you didn’t get invited to?” Sarah asks, her tone far too innocent for the pointed remark she’s making. It lands exactly as she intends it, and Kiara feels her blood rile up in anger. 

“You’re so certain I called the cops. Honestly, Sarah, I’d _love_ to see your evidence,” Kiara says, shaking her head and reaching across the counter for a bottle of Sprite. 

“I don’t need evidence,” Sarah shrugs. “I know you too well.” 

That comments stings, mostly because it’s true. Sarah does know her, or at least it felt like Sarah knew her. For a while, Kiara thought that maybe Sarah understood her better than anyone – better than the Pogues or her parents or anyone else in the world. And yeah, maybe Sarah is right, maybe she does know Kiara well enough to know that she did, in fact, call the cops. It still feels like a laughable statement, all things considered. If Sarah expects Kiara to stand down, it means she doesn’t understand Kiara at all. 

“Right,” Kiara says, mockingly. She opens the bottle of Sprite, pouring it into her cup until it’s topped off. “Well, you aren’t too hard to figure out yourself.”

“Oh, really?” Sarah crosses her arms over her chest. “Please, enlighten me.” 

Kiara slams the Sprite bottle down, splashing a little bit over the counter. “You’re just a spoiled rich bitch.” 

Sarah rolls her eyes, popping open the can she had grabbed earlier. “That’s a real original one, Kiara. Haven’t heard that before,” she says, taking a sip of her drink. She’s halfway turned to leave the kitchen and this conversation, but Kiara can’t let that happen. She can’t let Sarah have the last word after everything that has happened.

“Nothing in your life is real,” Kiara blurts out, and that catches Sarah’s attention. The shocked look on Sarah’s face spurs Kiara on, and she’s talking before she even really processes her own thoughts. “You go home to your mansion and you sit in your movie theater and you never have to do anything _real._ ” 

“You sure loved sitting in my movie theater when you were invited,” Sarah snaps back, her full attention pulled back into the conversation. The party is loud, the kitchen crowded with people, but no one seems to be paying attention to the two girls yelling at each other over the counter. It feels like Sarah and Kiara are in their own bubble of anger.

Kiara laughs humorlessly at Sarah’s comment, shaking her head. “You don’t get it, Sarah. Your entire life is wrapped in bubble wrap. You’ve never worked for anything you have.” 

“Just because my dad is successful doesn’t mean I don’t work for anything, Kiara,” Sarah says, her eyes bright with anger. She’s so angry, she’s stumbling over her words, hardly able to get them out. ”I work with the conservation team, and I volunteer –” 

Kiara laughs out loud, waving her hand as if to brush off Sarah’s comment. “You’re all about charity and helping the environment, but there’s people not a mile from your house that go to bed hungry every night and you could give two shits about them.”

Sarah recoils a bit at Kiara’s words, but the fire comes back into her just as quickly. “So that’s what this is about? The Pogues? You’re angry because I don’t care enough about them to meet your standards?”

Kiara flinches when she says _the Pogues,_ but she shakes her head quickly. It’s a bad move, and a wave of dizziness hits her like a train. Maybe she should have been more careful about how much vodka she poured in her cup, after all. The alcohol emboldens her, though, and she’s quick to regain her ground, coming for Sarah’s throat.

“No, you know what? This has nothing to do with them. This is about _you_ and your performative bullshit. You go and save the turtles because you’re _oh so good_ , and then you turn around and watch your boyfriend spit at people below his tax bracket. You don’t have the moral high ground here.” 

“You act all high and mighty, but you are no better than I am,” Sarah spits back at her. “You may have been friends with them at some point, but you dropped them the _second_ you got a better offer. Don’t you dare act like I’m the villain here.” 

Kiara takes a sharp intake of breath at that, because as much as she hates to admit it, Sarah is right. And it takes her far more than she’d like to admit to calm the anger and sadness bubbling up in her chest. Sarah does know her, after all.

“You know what? You’re right, we are the same,” Kiara says after a minute. “Two rich, privileged girls living in our mansions. Except I have the audacity to be upset about it. Is that why you’re mad? Because I called you out on it? You just sit in your castle and you don’t even care who your parents have to _fuck over_ to make that happen.” 

Sarah leans over the counter, a finger pointed at her. 

“Don’t you dare bring my family into this. My dad worked hard for everything we have. He made it out of the Cut on his own, and I’m not going to apologize for that.”

“You never apologize for anything, ever!” Kiara explodes, flailing her arms around. “This is all a game for you. You play every relationship like a game of chess, you manipulate everyone around you into doing what you want because you’ve never been told the word ‘no’ once in your fucking life!” 

Kiara knows she’s hit a nerve, because Sarah goes quiet for a moment. She sends her a dirty look, eyebrows furrowed and her mouth in a hard line, and Kiara would dare to say she looks hurt.

“When did you become such a bitch?” she says, words dripping with contempt. Kiara sets back into her shoulders, folding her arms.

“I thought you knew me,” she bites back. “Honestly, I feel bad for you, Sarah. 16 years old, and I can already see the rest of your life. One day, you’re going to look outside your perfect bubble and you’re going to realize that everything I’m saying is true.”

Sarah shakes her head at that, something like disgust lacing her big eyes.

“Fuck off, Kiara,” is all she says, before turning around and stalking out of the kitchen. 

“Gladly,” Kiara yells back – unwilling to let her have her dramatic exit. She looks into her half-empty vodka soda and downs it in one go. She makes herself another one, then, for good measure. 

\---------

When Kiara had begun attending parties with Sarah, she made a list of rules for herself. She didn’t want to end up as the inspiration behind a Criminal Minds episode.

_Rule number 1: Always eat before a party._

_Rule number 2: Know the person throwing the party._

_Rule number 3: Don’t go to a party without an exit plan._

_Rule number 4:_ _Never_ _leave your drink unattended._

It’s safe to say that tonight, rule number 3 has gone to hell in a handbasket. 

Kiara has never gone to a party without a clear plan of how she’d be getting home or where she’d be staying. She always, always had a plan, whether it was staying over at Scarlett’s house or catching a ride with Dennis. But tonight, in her rush to get out of the house, she simply hasn’t had time to think it over. 

Kiara can tell, even several vodka sodas in, that it was a fantastically bad idea. She had vaguely planned to walk home, but it’s dark enough outside that Kiara’s not sure she’d feel comfortable walking about a mile to her house if she was sober – and sober she is not. Yet she’s also not quite drunk enough to fall asleep in a bathtub or the front yard or anything like that. 

She’s standing in the corner of the kitchen, contemplating the pros and cons of her options when a familiar face pops up by her shoulder. 

“Hey Kie,” Cassidy Evans says, and Kiara jumps back a little in surprise. She hasn’t really talked to anyone all night, after the blow-up with Sarah, and her not-so-sober brain takes a moment to even register that someone is addressing her. She’s surprised to see that it’s Cassidy talking to her. They haven’t really had a proper conversation since they stopped sitting with each other in the lunchroom months ago. Kiara would still smile at her in the hallways, but that was the extent of their relationship these days.

“Oh, hey,” Kiara says, turning to look at her.

“How are you doing?” Cassidy asks, and Kiara laughs a little at the question, taking another sip of the drink she probably shouldn’t be having. 

“Me? The snitch? I’m doing great, Cass.” 

“Yeah,” Cassidy says slowly, almost carefully, looking at Kiara like she’s worried about her. “Um, I was kind of surprised you showed up to this party.” 

Kiara narrows her eyes just a little bit. “Open invitation means anyone can show up, last I checked.” 

“Yeah, yeah, no, I just mean – I’m surprised you wanted to come to something like this. You know, after everything.” Cassidy gestures around the party to make her point. They’re surrounded by the very people who, only a few weeks ago, were bombarding Kiara’s Instagram with rat emojis and barely concealed threats. 

Kiara takes a deep sigh, conceding the point. “I gotta get some social interaction in, right?” she offers as an explanation.

“Uh, yeah,” Cassidy says, nodding along. The worry doesn’t quite leave her face, but she seems to move on. “Anyways, um, I hate to ask, but how are you getting home?”

Kiara laughs, looking to the bottom of her cup. There’s only a little bit left. “I’ll be fine, Cass.”

“No, yeah, no doubt,” Cassidy pauses again, looking around the party. “It’s just…”

“It’s just what?” Kiara says, prompting Cassidy when she trails off.

“Ashley was supposed to drive me home,” Cassidy says, gesturing behind her to the living room. Kiara peeks around the corner, and she can see a girl who must be Ashley standing on top of the coffee table and screaming along to the song that’s playing over the speakers. “She started drinking, and I don’t really trust her to drive home anymore. I was hoping you had a reliable ride.” 

“Oh, sorry, Cass,” Kiara says, reaching her hand out and landing it on Cassidy’s shoulder. “I’d like to offer you a ride, but I’m actually walking home.”

Cassidy blinks in shock, looking at Kiara like she’s insane. “You’re going to walk home? Kiara, it’s pretty late, are you sure it’s a good idea?” 

Kiara shrugs, looking at the window. Cassidy’s not wrong, it’s pretty dark outside. “I’ll be fine,” she says with more confidence than she feels. “It's not that far, anyway.” 

Cassidy doesn’t look like she believes her even a little bit. “Oh, okay,” she shrugs. “It was worth a shot.” 

“You can come with,” Kiara suggests. “We can walk to my house and I can have my parents drive you home in the morning.” 

“Are you sure?” Cassidy sounds hesitant. “I don’t want to impose.” 

Kiara shrugs, taking another sip of her drink. “I’ve got an extra pair of pajamas. It’ll be better than crashing here, anyways.”

Cassidy furrows her brow at the suggestion. “Yeah, you’re right. If you’re okay with it, I might take you up on that offer. Thanks, Kie.”

“No problem,” Kiara says, breathing out a laugh. “I gotta keep a good record with you. You might be the only person on this island that doesn’t hate me.” 

Cassidy smiles at her. “Yeah, that’s not true,” she says casually, though it sounds like there’s some weight to her words. Kiara’s about to ask her what she means, but Cassidy moves the conversation forward with very little pause. “When were you thinking of leaving? I can stay as long as you want.” 

Kiara looks around the table, at all the people she doesn’t want to be around, and she throws her cup into the trash. “Let’s bail, this party’s lame anyways.”

Kiara and Cassidy make their way through the kitchen and the living room, shoving their elbows at the copious amount of teenagers packed into both rooms. Eventually, Kiara bursts through the front door, happy to finally be out of the stuffy house...

… and she walks straight into a cloud of smoke, coughing a little at the smell. Apparently, in the last two hours since she walked in, the porch has been claimed by the upperclassman stoners. Kiara waves her hand in front of her face, making her way off the porch as quickly as possible. 

“Hey, Snitch!” one of the assholes calls out as Kiara tries to step off the porch. She rolls her eyes, ignoring the voice, trying to get through the crowd of people. “Hey! Rafe here wants a repeat of Cotillion Night!” 

Kiara freezes at that, almost involuntarily, whipping around to look behind her. She doesn’t know who was talking, but her eyes immediately land on Rafe, leaning against the railing on the porch. He looks a little worried at first, but his face quickly falls into a sleazy smile. 

“Cotillion Night?” Kiara spits out. “Nothing happened at Cotillion.”

“That’s not what Rafe said,” some kid on the soccer team says. He claps Rafe on the back, and Rafe smirks back in response.

 _“Excuse me?”_ Kiara nearly shouts.

“Yeah, I mean, if you’re still down, I’m down,” Rafe says, letting the innuendo play out, and Kiara nearly vomits. 

“I was _never_ down. You’re disgusting, Rafe.”

“Well, that’s not what you said that night,” Rafe says, taking a step forward towards her. Kiara scrunches her face up, turning to look at Kelce. 

“You’re seriously going to let him say this shit? When you know it’s not true?” Kiara says incredulously, and Kelce, to his credit, at least looks a little reluctant. 

“Rafe told me what happened when you disappeared,” Kelce says, shrugging his shoulders and taking a sip of his beer. 

“What happened?! _Nothing_ happened! Kelce, do you hear yourself? I was with you the whole night!” Kiara says, her brain working overtime as the pieces fall into place. The weird interaction with Rafe at Cotillion; Kelce suddenly ghosting her, after. The realization has her blood boiling. 

“I don’t lie to my boys, Kiara,” Rafe says, and Kiara whirls to face him. 

“That’s really rich-” Kiara starts, but Cassidy tugs on her arm, pulling her back. 

“Let’s go, Kie,” Cassidy mutters under her breath, and Kiara backs down just a little bit. She doesn’t turn away from Rafe, and his smile makes her skin crawl.

“You girls leaving?” Rafe says, and oh god, Kiara is going to punch him. “Who’s picking you up?”

The way Rafe asks the question, Kiara is absolutely not going to tell him the truth. 

“JJ,” she says without thinking it through, spitting out the first name that she knows will piss him off. She immediately wants to eat her words, but still she feels a little bit of a thrill when Rafe’s eyes narrow in anger. 

“Crawling back to the Pogues? That’s sad, even for you, Kiara.” 

“I’ll kick your ass-” 

“Kiara!” Cassidy cries, tugging her arm even harder, pulling her down the steps of the porch. “Jesus Christ, could you not start a fist fight right now?” 

Kiara reluctantly allows herself to be dragged off the porch, eventually turning her back to the house and ignoring the taunts that come from the boys. Once they are out of earshot, Cassidy takes a deep breath, visibly relaxing. Kiara doesn’t share the feeling. 

“That fucking asshole!” she explodes, enraged. “He’s such a liar – he came onto me at Cotillion, and I told him to fuck off.” 

She’s seething, wrapping her arms around herself in the breezy summer air. Cassidy shakes her head, mostly ignoring Kiara’s ramblings.

“Kie, I don’t feel comfortable walking to your house right now,” Cassidy says, shooting a look back at the porch. 

Kiara sighs, running her hand through her hair. “Yeah, me neither,” she reluctantly admits. 

“Can you call him?” Cassidy says, and Kiara does a double take. 

“Call who?” 

“JJ.” 

Kiara blinks in surprise. It’s a perfectly reasonable question, especially given what just happened, and maybe if she didn’t have one too many vodka sodas she would have seen it coming. All the same, it makes something twist painfully in Kiara’s stomach at the suggestion. She back pedals immediately, shaking her head. “I just said that to get under Rafe’s nerves –” 

“Oh,” Cassidy says, her face visibly falling. “Maybe your parents?” 

Kiara contemplates it for barely half a second. There’s really no decision to be made. There’s no universe in which Kiara could call her mom and dad to pick her up drunk from a rager at Max Smith’s house, especially with a bunch of upperclassmen smoking weed in full sight on the front porch. Her parents are probably already asleep, and she’ll catch hell if she wakes them up. And she doesn’t even want to think of what would happen if she stumbled into their car drunk. 

“JJ it is,” Kiara says reluctantly, pulling her phone out of her back pocket. 

He picks up on the third ring with a pissed off _“What?”_ and then proceeds to sigh loudly into the phone when Kiara explains the situation. She leaves out key details, like the fact that the reason she won’t walk home is _Rafe fucking Cameron._

“Why can’t you just call your parents?” JJ says, sounding wholly disinterested. “Or, I don’t know, any one of your friends.” 

Kiara’s blood is still boiling from the confrontation with Rafe, and she’s more than a little drunk, and the mere tension of being on the phone with JJ all culminates in her yelling, “I don’t have any fucking friends, JJ!” 

Cassidy looks up at her in surprise, and Kiara bites her tongue, internally cursing herself as she realizes how deranged she must sound. The stunned silence from JJ’s side of the phone only makes the entire situation more awkward. “And my mom is a tyrant, I can’t call her right now,” she adds lamely, just to break the tension.

“Are you drunk?” JJ asks, and Kiara wants to scream into the phone. “Is that why you can’t call your mom?” 

Never did Kiara think she’d see the day when JJ, of all people, would sound so condescending at her. This was such a bad idea – and yet, it’s kind of her only option.

“Yes, JJ, okay? I can’t call her,” Kiara seethes out. "And Cassidy and I cannot walk our drunken asses to my house, and the only other option is falling asleep in this fucking yard, so no thanks. Do you really think I'd be calling you if I had a fucking alternative?"

It takes a second for her to realize what she just said, but then she’s slapping a hand over her mouth. Cassidy looks at her like she’s crazy and, honestly, Kiara kind of agrees with her.

“Jesus Christ–” JJ breathes out.

“No! JJ, fuck – I didn’t mean it like that!” Kiara yells into the phone, trying desperately to keep her emotions in check. She feels hot, frustrated tears start to gather in her eyes, and she has to take a deep breath before she spirals. 

“Whatever,” JJ says under his breath, and Kiara feels like stomping her feet. She has no idea what to say. It’s like her brain is refusing to work with her, like every thought she has is completely backwards. 

JJ’s quiet for long enough that Kiara thinks he might have hung up. “Shit,” Kiara says, running her hand through her hair and trying to bite back a sob. She’s ready to hang up her phone and begin praying for both her and Cassidy.

“Where are you?” JJ says, and Kiara nearly jumps at the sound, shocked by the fact that he hadn’t hung up. 

“Max Smith’s house. Just by the driveway, behind the hedge.”

  
  


\---------

  
  


Kiara feels like she doesn’t breathe until JJ’s dad’s truck pulls up in front of Max’s house, and Cassidy visibly relaxes next to her as well. Kiara immediately beelines for the car, Cassidy not even a step behind her. The two of them had taken up shop behind Max’s hedges, well out of sight of the assholes on the porch. It was a safe distance and they were fairly hidden, but there was still a chance Rafe and his douche bags could stumble down the yard and find them crouched in the dark shrubbery. It was a less than ideal circumstance, the entire situation leaving both of them on edge the entire time. Honestly, Kiara can’t make her way to the truck fast enough, the inevitable awkward drive with JJ and Cassidy feeling like a blessed relief. 

She doesn’t expect JJ to hop out of the driver’s seat, taking a few strides to meet the two girls in the middle of the driveway. He shoves his hands deep into his pockets, and his eyes meet Kiara’s in the dark. He opens his mouth as if he’s going to say something, but he’s cut off. 

“Is that the Rat’s ride? Is she still here?” Rafe yells down from the porch, and JJ’s eyes immediately shoot up to where Rafe is standing on the porch. Even after the incident at the grocery store, Kiara feels some relief at the fact that, as much as JJ may dislike her, he dislikes Rafe even more. 

“What the fuck did he just call you?” JJ demands, taking half a step forward, and Kiara just shrugs her shoulders, trying to play it off. 

“Nothing, please, can we just leave?” Kiara asks, nodding her head towards the truck. JJ doesn’t move. 

“Maybank was probably hitting it on Cotillion Night too, huh?” Rafe yells, and Kiara cringes at his words. She folds in on herself a little bit, wanting to get out of this party with _some_ dignity, but it seems like that might be impossible. She thought she had it under control, but her frustrated tears spring up again at Rafe’s words. Tonight just _royally sucks._

JJ looks at her for less than half a second before lunging towards the house. 

“He’s not worth it,” Cassidy warns, but JJ’s not listening. 

“What the fuck did you just say to her?” He yells back at Rafe once he realizes Kiara’s not going to give him any answers. In a second, he’s moving to side step around Kiara and make his way towards the porch.

“JJ!” Kiara yells, reaching to clutch his shirt in her hand, trying to tug him back towards the car. 

JJ looks at her, stunned. She wonders, vaguely, if she overstepped a boundary by grabbing him like that, but JJ doesn’t look angry, just confused. Honestly, Kiara’s confused too. 

“I’m sorry,” Kiara says, because she has no idea what else to say. She takes a shuddering breath and drops her hand from his shirt. “I’m sorry, I just – can we please leave?” 

JJ hesitates a second longer, sending another glare up at Rafe. 

“Yeah,” he finally says. “Yeah, come on.” 

  
  


\---------

  
  


It’s awkward in the truck, with Cassidy squished in between JJ and Kiara and none of them talking. Cassidy tries to make some casual conversation at first, but neither Kiara or JJ are very receptive, so it dies down quickly. Kiara leans her head against the window, and JJ focuses on driving. 

Kiara doesn’t comment when JJ heads towards Cassidy’s house first. She doesn’t mention the fact that her house is much closer, and that, technically speaking, it would make a lot more sense for him to drop her off first. She knows JJ knows this. She doesn’t know what to make of the fact that he’s actively ignoring it. 

Dropping Cassidy off is anticlimactic. She lives on the far, far side of the Cut, even past JJ’s house. Her grandmother is still up when they pull into the driveway, and Cassidy waves at them once inside so they know she’s safe. 

Somehow, the silence when they are backing out of Cassidy’s driveway is more intense than it had been for the last ten minutes. Kiara pulls her legs up onto the seat, clutching them to her chest, and wills her frustrated tears away. That’s the thing with Kiara: she doesn’t cry often, but once she starts, it’s hard for her to stop. 

“Sorry you didn’t have anyone else to call,” JJ says after a second, his voice sounding disconcerting in the otherwise quiet cab. His tone is neutral, but his words cut deep. 

“I didn’t mean it like that,” Kiara repeats softly. “I meant –”

“We all know what you meant, Kie,” JJ says, but he doesn’t sound angry. He just sounds tired. Kiara hates it all the same. 

“Can you –” Kiara takes a deep breath, trying to keep her feelings under control. “Can you just let me speak for a second?” 

It’s silent for a long moment, and Kiara takes it as permission. She’s hesitant, though, trying to formulate her thoughts. Her own emotions are so confusing, she can barely understand them.

“I just meant…” Kiara trails off, trying to come up with a way to phrase the statement _‘I’m the shittiest person I know and I don’t deserve to be able to call you to help me’_ so it doesn’t sound pathetic. 

“I already picked your ass up,” JJ says, stopping the truck at a stop sign. He takes a left hand turn, and Kiara doesn’t mention that it’s the long way back to her house. “You really don’t need to come up with a lie.” 

“I’m not lying!” Kiara nearly snaps. She’s so fed up with the fact that everyone on this fucking island has such a wrong perception of her, even her best friend. Ex best friend. Whatever. “I’ve been a bitch to you and I shouldn’t be able to call you for help. That’s what I meant.”

She cuts right to the heart of it, and it hangs there for a second, settling between them. The silence is nearly suffocating. Kiara ventures a glance at JJ. He’s staring straight ahead at the road, drumming his hands on the steering wheel in a pattern Kiara doesn’t recognize. He looks like he’s really concentrating on the road, but Kiara knows that’s not the case. JJ knows the roads of Kildare like the back of his hand. 

When he doesn’t respond, Kiara starts to panic. She opens her mouth, and then words just come tumbling out. “I mean, god, I’m _still_ such a bitch,” Kiara says, reaching down to play with the hem of her shorts. “Like, you probably had plans, and I probably ruined them, and I made you take your dad’s car even though you don’t even have a permit yet –”

“Kiara,” JJ says, cutting off her rambling. She looks up at him. “Bitch or not, you can always call me if you’re in trouble.” 

Kiara sits with that for a minute, going back to fiddling with the bottom of her shorts. “I shouldn’t be able to. I don’t deserve it.” 

“It’s not about deserving shit,” JJ declares, and she knows from his tone that he won’t listen to any argument. “If you need a way to get home, you have my number for a reason.” 

Kiara remains quiet, because for a while she had JJ’s number for a lot more than just a random Saturday night taxi service. She had JJ’s number for funny memes and surfing sessions and plans to meet up with the Pogues. It’s sad how far they’ve come from that. 

“And if Rafe Cameron is giving you trouble, I want to kick his fucking ass,” JJ says, and he sounds serious, but when she looks at him she spots the tiniest smile in the corner of his lips. “ _Please_ , give me every opportunity to beat the living shit out of that prick.” 

Kiara laughs a little, but it comes out sounding somewhat like a sob. She’s still smiling, and so is he, and it feels so good to be with him again that Kiara doesn’t ever want the moment to end. 

Unfortunately, that’s not how things go. Despite him taking the long way back, they’re already coming up to her house, pulling into her driveway. 

“Thank you,” she barely whispers as he parks the car.

“Yeah, whatever,” JJ replies, but it doesn’t sound like an insult. 

Kiara makes no move to get out of the car. He doesn’t push her to go. They both stare ahead, avoiding each other and the elephant in the room with practiced finesse.

When it’s finally too much, when she’s wrought her hands in her lap so tight they almost hurt, Kiara breaks down under the tension. “Would John B tell me to fuck off if I came around to bring some food from the Wreck?” she blurts out in one breath. It’s a risky move, mentioning John B, and Kiara knows it, but she can’t help herself. She needs to know what JJ thinks. 

JJ takes a deep sigh.

“I don’t know,” he says, and Kiara knows it’s a lie. JJ may well in fact be the only person on the planet who knows exactly how John B would react. But she doesn’t feel bold enough to call him out on it. 

“I just thought, maybe, you know, with Big John…” Kiara trails off, realizing far too late what a terrible idea it was to bring Big John into the conversation. 

“Yeah, I know,” JJ cuts her off, his voice razor sharp. Kiara recognizes his _take no prisoners_ tone, and she waits another minute before proceeding with caution.

“How bad is it?” she asks gently, testing the waters.

JJ shakes his head, shrugging his shoulders. 

“Pretty fucking terrible, Kie,” he says. 

Kiara bites her lip for a second, contemplating her next move. Finally, she just blurts out, “Is he moving to Colorado?” 

JJ whips his head around to look at her, his eyes wide, clearly not following her train of thought. At JJ’s confusion, Kiara sighs and clarifies her question. “John B, I mean. To be with his mom.” 

Kiara stumbles over the word _mom,_ the word feeling wrong and far too intimate for John B’s relationship with the woman who gave birth to him. JJ gives her a somber laugh and shakes his head. 

“Nah,” he says. “Uncle T is staying with him at the Chateau. Clarise has barely talked to either of them.” 

Kiara nods at the sentence, feeling a little bit of relief that John B won’t be moving to Colorado anytime soon even though her heart breaks for him all the same. She knows John B hasn’t seen his mom since he was three. There’s pictures of her around the Chateau and Kiara’s talked about her with John B on rare occasions, usually after he gets a letter from her in the mail. 

For JJ, his mom is as taboo a topic as they come, and he’ll shut down the second she’s brought up. John B talks about his mom like she’s some distant celebrity – someone who John B knows about, but whose existence doesn’t affect his everyday life. Sometimes, Kiara doesn’t know what’s worse.

Kiara sits with that for a minute, pondering the shitstorm the boys have been through without her. The silence feels longer, more drawn out. Like it’s weighing on Kiara’s chest, blocking her from breathing properly. 

“Pope said you would come back,” JJ adds after a minute – quiet, almost lost into the night. It’s like he’s reading her mind, like he knows exactly what to say to twist the knife just a little deeper.

“JJ…” Kiara says, her heart breaking at his words, but he just shakes his head back at her.

“Swore up and down that you’d come back once you heard about Big John,” JJ says, even though he trips up on Big John’s name. He continues on, undeterred. “I told him he was being stupid. I should have bet him money, guess we all know who was right.” 

Kiara feels like she can’t get any words out of her throat. “I wanted to –” she says, but he cuts her off with a scoff. “I did,” she insists, “I just… didn’t think I could.” 

“Bullshit,” JJ says without even a hint of hesitation. “What part of our friendship ever made you think you couldn’t come back?”

Kiara bites her tongue. “Nothing,” she says finally, because she doesn’t want to fight with JJ. She’s done enough damage, she doesn’t need to end tonight in yet another burnt bridge. She goes to reach for the door handle, but JJ groans, hitting his head on his head rest. 

“No, seriously, Kie. Answer the fucking question.” 

Kiara turns to look at him, puzzled, and something in JJ’s eyes is just frustrating enough, just accusatory enough for Kiara to retaliate. 

“Okay, well, how about we start with that fucking night at the Boneyard?” she challenges, effectively sucking all the air out of the car. JJ’s speechless for a second. 

“You literally brought _Rafe fucking Cameron,_ ” he finally says, when he finds his own words back. 

“He gave me a ride!” Kiara protests, trying and failing to hide her visceral reaction to Rafe’s name. 

“You literally never needed a ride to the Boneyard before that,” JJ points out, and Kiara makes a frustrated noise.

“Yeah, no shit, because I always went with you guys! I never had to worry about how to get home.” 

“When I invited you,” JJ says slowly, “I was under the impression that you’d be coming with us. I didn’t think you had to travel with a whole crew of Kooks to feel comfortable around us.” 

“That wasn’t even it,” Kiara insists, but JJ looks at her like he doesn’t believe a word she’s saying. “Sarah was worried for no fucking reason, and she asked all those people to join.”

“And you wanted _her_ there,” JJ points out, and Kiara’s heart falls in her chest. She knows he’s right, but at this moment she can’t imagine what was going through her head when she wanted Sarah at the Boneyard. She has no idea how she could have ever thought that would be a good plan. It seems completely ridiculous in hindsight.

“I still don’t see why it’s such a big deal who I got a ride with,” Kiara says, steering the conversation away from Sarah. 

“Because it made it clear whose side you were on,” JJ says, and Kiara startles a little at his words. 

“No it did not.”

“Yes,” JJ insists. “It did.” 

“Why the fuck would I want to be on Rafe’s side?” Kiara says, the disgust clear in her voice. JJ laughs humorlessly at her question.

“What are you asking me? Why the fuck did you show up with him if not to make it clear to us exactly where we stood?”

Kiara’s silent as she takes in JJ’s words. She sees the Boneyard party from the Pogue’s perspective for the first time, and suddenly it makes sense. “I didn’t see it that way,” Kiara says, her mind reeling. 

“Yeah, I’m sure,’ JJ sneers, and Kiara feels her eyes start to water. _Again._ Jesus, she needs to get a grip.

“I’m serious, JJ,” her voice breaks a little. “I didn’t – the only reason he was there was to drive us. I swear to god, JJ, I came to the Boneyard that night to apologize. I wanted to make amends.” 

“Then why the fuck didn’t you?” JJ asks, tired, and Kiara’s doesn’t know how to tell him she’s been wondering the same question for months. 

“I don’t know,” she just says, her voice defeated. “I don’t know, I was scared I’d say the wrong thing, and I was scared you would get mad. Then everything got so out of hand so quickly. Like, I get why John B and Pope were so angry, but I couldn’t… I just couldn’t deal with it,” Kiara finishes lamely. 

JJ looks her square in the eyes, astonished. 

“What the fuck happened to you, Kie?” he asks. 

“What do you mean?” 

“That doesn’t sound like you at all. The Kie I grew up with – I don’t know. I think she would have at least tried.” 

“That night was just really –”

“It’s not just that night!” JJ blurts out suddenly. “It’s any of the nights before or – or after, all the nights you _didn’t_ try! You changed long before you left us, Kie, but I thought you still might be able to stand up for something. Or at the very least stand up for yourself.”

His words hit her, hard. His anger at her, and disappointment, but also his genuine confusion.

“I don’t know what happened,” she admits, wrapping her arms around her stomach. “I was so wrapped up in all the stupid shit I couldn’t even see myself. I lost myself for a little while.” She bites down her lip, her heart racing in her chest, the vulnerability of this moment. Then she takes a deep breath and whispers, “I miss the old Kie.” 

“I do too,” JJ says, and it feels like he’s admitting something far more important. His voice isn’t kind, but it’s not angry either.

“Yeah?” Kiara asks hesitantly. 

“Yeah.” JJ nods. After a second, he shakes his head and adds, “Call me when you find her.”

Kiara takes that for what it is: an invitation to get the fuck out. She reaches for the door handle quickly, practically falling out of the truck. She’s grabbing her phone off the seat when JJ reaches for her.

“Hey,” he says suddenly, and Kiara looks up at him, readying herself for whatever he might say. His hand hovers just a few inches from hers for a second before he lets it fall onto the seat between them. “Wave to me once you’re in the house, or whatever.” 

  
  
When Kiara gets into the house, she turns towards her big kitchen window and waves at the dark outline of JJ’s truck, letting him know she got inside safely. As his headlights pull out of the driveway, Kiara deflates, her entire body collapsing. She falls into one of the kitchen chairs, holding her head in her hands and feeling more conflicted than ever. On one hand, that was not what Kiara would call a _pleasant conversation._ On the other hand, it finally feels like something might actually be changing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> annnnnd the next chapter is: "A Slow Return To Something Almost Normal"


	22. A Slow Return To Something Almost Normal

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ~ _i don't know about you, but i'm feeling 22_ ~
> 
> Welcome to chapter 22 on this very special evermore release day. Taylor really said "I'm gonna make Annie's day". I stayed up last night to listen to it and I listened to it two more times at work. 
> 
> Also, sorry this chapter took a Hot Minute. Rebel without a claus took over my life (in the best way) and then I struggled to figure out how humans say words for roughly a week.
> 
> Thank you to my lovely beta reader [lemon_drizzle_cake](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lemon_drizzle_cake/pseuds/lemon_drizzle_cake) for her endless patience as I tried to figure out how to force John B into the shower. (seriously, I think I rewrote that part 12 times).

The conversation with JJ lingers in the back of Kiara’s mind for the next few days, driving her a little bit crazy. She goes over everything they said over and over again until she literally can’t take it anymore.

And time and time again, she keeps coming back to the same part. JJ had said that the old Kiara would have at least tried. And the truth is, he has a point – Kiara hasn’t been trying recently. 

There’s a lot of things she wishes she could change about the past year, a lot of things she wishes she would have realized earlier. She can't go back and stop herself from ruining her relationship with the boys, nor can she go back to that day at the turtle hatch and tell herself to run away from Sarah as fast as possible. All she can control is the here and now, and all she can do is try. Kiara may not completely feel like her old self again, but she _knows_ what she needs to do to feel better. 

That’s how she ends up taking the familiar path to the Chateau after her shift at the Wreck. She’s laden down by a take out bag from the Wreck filled with as much food as she could manage, hoping it’ll look more like a peace offering than straight-up bribery. 

The food is the simple part. Kiara’s always brought the boys snacks, and it’s a no-brainer that whatever conversation they’re about to have is going to need a little food. It’s the talking part that is giving her pause. Kiara still has no clue what she’s going to say, and she’s running out of time to brainstorm. Dangerously close to the Chateau and she hasn’t come up with an apology passed, _“Hey John B, sorry your dad died – or maybe he’s missing, I guess – and I fucked off for almost a year. I’m a social outcast again, if that makes you feel any better.”_

She’s scared that she’s going to show up, see John B’s face, and draw a blank. Or worse, she’s going to put her foot in her mouth and somehow piss him off even more, if that’s even possible. Maybe John B will yell at her, maybe he’ll tell her to fuck off, maybe he’ll graciously accept her apology and they can reach some sort of civility. She’s under no illusion that they’ll ever go back to normal, and maybe the boys will never forgive her, after everything.

She takes a deep breath, and reminds herself that, in the end, it doesn’t really matter. She can’t control how they’ll react, she can’t control the fall out. All she can control is herself.

And right now, she’s got to force herself forward, one step at a time towards the Chateau. It’s the first step, probably in a long line of steps, to feel like herself again. Old Kiara would have done this. Whatever version of Kiara this is, she’s going to do it too. 

The Chateau comes far too quickly, and Kiara stands at the top of the driveway for a moment to stare at it. In a lot of ways, the Chateau hasn’t changed at all. It’s the same as it’s always been – an old fishing shack, a ramshackle building made of mismatched furniture and oddly shaped rooms. Small and homey and a little bit of a disaster.

But somehow, standing in front of it after months of roaming the halls of Tanneyhill, it feels different than what she remembers. Smaller. Kiara cringes at the ridiculousness of the thought. The Chateau had been her second home growing up, and now she looks at it and compares it to the Figure Eight mansions _._

It still feels imposing, though. Even the massive, well guarded Tanneyhill would feel like less of a fortress than the Chateau. The years of memories and friendship surround the fishing shack like an army, keeping her from entering the grounds.

Kiara kind of feels like vomiting. Her feet are concrete blocks. She can’t move a step forward, and she won’t allow herself to go backwards. Instead, she stands in the middle of the driveway entrance, feeling like an idiot. 

“Kiara,” John B’s voice comes from across the yard, and she whips around to see him. 

John B is standing by the chicken coop, the old one that Big John had cobbled together at the end of fifth grade, when John B and JJ had incubated eggs for their science fair project. The rooster, if he’s even still alive, was the only successful egg they had. In the intervening years, the chicken population at the Chateau had grown somewhat successfully. There were a couple mishaps, and a day in seventh grade when John B cried for four hours because a fox had killed most of the chickens in the night, but for a group of boys who could barely keep themselves alive, they sure had done a good job of raising the chickens. 

John B’s holding a bucket in one hand, having just fed them. Like JJ, he looks older, his hair longer and his remaining baby fat disappearing. His shoulders fill out his t-shirt in a way they didn’t the last time she saw him. 

“John B,” Kiara chokes out, trying to read his face and tell where his mind is. He was always an open book of a boy, someone Kiara could take one look at and immediately understand. Now, though, she’s not sure what he’s thinking. Maybe she lost that ability. 

He doesn’t look angry, though. Maybe confused, but not angry. Kiara’s immediate gut reaction is to run up to him and hug him, like her body doesn’t remember the last year as well as her head does.

John B takes a hesitant step forward, and Kiara springs into action, remembering that there’s a reason she’s here.

“I brought food!” she blurts out with a little too much enthusiasm. She holds up the bag of take-out she has in her hands as evidence.

“Oh,” John B says, kind of startled but vaguely appreciative nonetheless. “Yeah, thank you. That’s, uh, very nice of you.” 

John B’s voice goes up a little at the end of his sentence, like he’s asking a question. Kiara curses the awkward air around them. 

“I don’t mean to barge in,” Kiara says, taking a deep breath.

John B looks at her for a second, like he’s still trying to figure her out. 

“I’m leaving for work in a little bit, but, uh – do you want to come in?” he finally says, nodding towards the Chateau. 

“Yeah,” Kiara says quickly. “Yeah, for a little bit.” 

John B nods again, turning on his feet to head up to the front door of the Chateau. Kiara falls into step behind John B as he hops up the steps to the house. She tries not to think too hard about what she’ll say if JJ and Pope are inside. 

The screen door of the Chateau screeches open, and a voice calls out from the kitchen.

“Hey! What on God’s green earth did you and your friend do to this pan, Johnny?”

Kiara opens her mouth to greet Big John, before she snaps it shut, falling back a step. She’s struck by the realization that it’s definitely not Big John calling out, and she suddenly remembers JJ mentioned that Uncle T was staying with John B. 

Kiara had met Uncle T a few times, on the occasions when he visited the Chateau in between jobs. He’d come around a couple of times a year, popping in for visits, but he never stayed long. Stepping into the kitchen, Kiara sees him leaning over the sink, scrubbing away at a pan. Not much has changed since she last saw him. His hair has the same bushiness that seems to plague all the Routledge men, but that is where the resemblance between the three of them stops. Uncle T has a young face, tanned from hours working in the sun. Big John was gruff, his voice a low, calming rumble around the Chateau. Uncle T, in comparison, has more energy about him, a jovial sharpness that Big John never had. Yet still, there’s something in his tone, or his voice, or maybe his choice of words that feels painfully familiar.

When he turns to look at John B, his eyes fall on Kiara, and his face screws up in confusion. 

“You’re new,” he says, seemingly unaware of the implications of that sentence. He may not look like him, but it feels like Big John himself is silently judging her from wherever he might be. 

“Uncle T, you know Kiara.” John B reminds him, his voice a little tight.

“Huh, I guess I do,” Uncle T says, turning back to the pot in front of him. “You’re the one who instigated the Great Spatula Fight a few summers ago, right?” 

Kiara blinks in surprise. “JJ was the one who started it,” she says automatically, even though she hardly remembers the fact. It was more than a few summers ago – probably even before Pope joined them. The only thing the phrase _Great Spatula Fight_ calls to mind is the faintest memory of hiding behind the pullout couch, clutching a kitchen utensil, and thinking _I’m going to kill JJ._ So, really, there’s no way whatever happened was her fault. 

Uncle T burst out in laughter, lessening the awkward tension in the kitchen immediately. “Should’ve known it was his fault,” Uncle T pauses for a moment, holding up the pot he had been cleaning. “Kid’s still causing trouble. This was supposed to be mac and cheese.”

Uncle T tilts the pan up in the sink, showing Kiara the damage. Almost the entirety of the bottom of the pan is covered in burnt noodles, some spots diligently scraped away with a brillo pad.

“We got distracted,” John B says, reaching up to rub the back of his neck. “But we stopped the fire."

Uncle T looks at Kiara hopelessly. “I think this might be beyond repair.”

“I mean…” Kiara trails off, cringing at the sight. It reminds her of the hundreds of ruined cooking utensils she mishandled at the Wreck.

“Beyond repair,” Uncle T says with more certainty.

“Yeah, I think so,” Kiara admits, nodding slowly, and Uncle T sighs. 

“Can’t leave two teenage boys alone for five minutes, can ya?” Uncle T dries his hands on a towel, then looks at Kiara contemplatively. “Can you keep this boy in check?” 

“Um,” Kiara says, looking between Uncle T and John B. Uncle T had lessened the tension, but John B’s still lukewarm. She doesn’t know what to do with this type of question when they are hardly even talking. “I think so.”

“Kiara brought food,” John B cuts in, effectively ending the conversation. Kiara holds up the bag of food as confirmation. “If you want some.”

Uncle T sets the brillo pad in the sink, turning to look at them. “Nah, I better leave that to you boys,” Uncle T says, backing up towards the door. “You came to the right place to get rid of some food, Kiara. They’re like vacuums.”

“Growing boys, Uncle T,” John B chastises. 

_“Vacuums,”_ Uncle T insists, backing his way out of the kitchen and heading to the kitchen table where a pile of keys has accumulated. He grabs a pair off the top, checking to make sure they are the right ones. “Besides, I gotta get to the store today before this kid develops scurvy. Either of you need a ride anywhere?”

Kiara’s tempted to take his offer, the long walk home a little daunting and the impending conversation even more so, but John B beats her to it.

“I’m going to take the Pogue to work,” John B says, before half turning to Kiara. “I’m heading to Figure Eight anyways, I could give you a ride.” 

Kiara sucks in a breath but nods her head regardless. “I’ll catch a ride with John B. Thank you, though.”

“Suit yourself,” he says, headed for the door. “See y’all later!” He throws over his shoulder before he’s gone. 

Whatever humor Uncle T brough to the conversation is sucked out as soon as he leaves the kitchen, and Kiara and John B stand in awkward silence for a moment. Kiara takes a step towards the counter and lifts the bag of takeout on top of it, her back towards John B. She turns around, about to say something, but John B beats her to it.

“What are you doing here, Kie?” he cuts in, like he’s waiting for the ball to drop. His tone reminds her a lot of JJ’s in the car a few days ago. He’s not necessarily angry, he just sounds tired. 

Kiara contemplates his question for a second. “I’m trying,” she finally decides. “I wanted to see you. I know everything in the last year has been shitty, but… I’m trying.” 

It looks, for a second, like John B is holding back a biting remark. It passes, though, and he nods his head towards the bag on the counter. “Thanks, I guess. For the food.”

“It’s the least I could do,” Kiara says automatically, trying to hide the way her eyes flicker immediately to the picture of Big John on the wall. 

She doesn’t hide it well enough, and John B follows her gaze. “ You can just ask, you know.” 

Kiara sucks in a breath, suprised by John B’s willingness to broach the subject of his dad. “I guess that’s kind of the elephant in the room, huh?” she says without any humor.

“It’s the elephant in every fucking room, Kie,” John B says, leaning back against the counter. “No one ever mentions him, but I know everyone is thinking about it.” 

“Does it help to talk about it? About him?” Kiara asks delicately, and John B shakes his head. 

“I don’t know. I haven’t really had the chance, I guess,” John B tears his eyes away from the picture, and looks back at Kiara. “Do you have somewhere to be?” 

Kiara blinks in confusion, trying to decide if that’s his polite way of telling her he wants her to leave or if he’s genuinely asking. She takes a risk and admits, “No, I’m free for the rest of the day.”

John B lifts himself off the counter, reaching into the takeout bag to pull out its contents. “Want to share some fries?”

Kiara shuffles on her feet a little. “I brought the food for you guys.”

John B shrugs, gesturing around the empty Chateau. “I’m the only one here.” He takes the boxes with him, stacking too many of them precariously on top of each other, and maneuvers his way over to the dining room table. He sets the fries in the middle, lifting the lid open, and he turns to her with a hint of a smile. As clear an invitation as she’s ever seen.

 _Can’t back out now,_ Kiara thinks, taking a seat across from John B. “I guess I could use a few fries.” 

They spend the next few minutes eating in silence. It’s awkward and tense, but it gives Kiara a chance to look around the Chateau. 

The couch is pulled out into a bed, blankets piled at the end in the way JJ leaves them when he spends the night. If it had been Pope, the blankets would have been pulled into some form of order, whether he made the bed or folded the sheets at the foot of it. There’s a pile of Pogue-sized sweatshirts in the corner of the living room, and coffee mugs and empty plates dotting every surface. John B’s door is propped open by a pile of clothes, his room looking much the same as it was a year ago. Next to John B’s room, Big John’s door is shut tight. 

Things are the same and different all at once. 

“So… how are you doing, Kie?” John B says, breaking Kiara out of her thoughts.

Something has changed in John B’s voice in the silence. His tone is softer than before, a little worried, but more familiar. Less guarded. 

It’s enough for Kiara to forget herself for a moment. 

“Doing great,” she says sarcastically, looking down at the fry she’s holding. She freezes as soon as the words leave her mouth, her eyes shooting up to meet John B’s. 

The concern on his face grows, and Kiara curses herself for somehow making this about her. John B’s lost his dad, and she’s complaining because she’s in the middle of a girl fight. 

“Seriously, I’m fine,” Kiara amends quickly, dropping her fry and shaking her head. “Just… alot going on.” Kiara cringes at her words again. 

John B doesn’t seem phased by her visible cringing, and he just nods a little at her words. Kiara takes a deep breath.

“I’m really sorry, John B,” she rushes out, and the silence after is suffocating. 

“It’s not your fault.” 

“It definitely is,” Kiara says, and John B’s face falls in recognition. He clearly hadn’t expected her to apologize for going MIA.

“Just a lot going on?” he offers, half smiling, and Kiara shrugs. 

“Just a lot of bullshit,” she says, crossing her arms in front of herself. “Stuff that didn’t matter.” 

John B shrugs, picking up a burger. “It mattered to you.” 

Kiara doesn’t know what to make of his tone. “Doesn’t mean it wasn’t bullshit.”

John B looks like he’s going to say something else, but the alarm on his phone buzzes, startling both him and Kiara. 

“Shit,” John B says, picking up his phone and looking at the time. “I gotta get to work.” 

He shoves more than half of the burger into his mouth in one bite, and the two of them make quick work of shoving all the takeout containers in the fridge.

“Ready to go?” John says, grabbing the keys to the Pogue from the table. 

“Yeah,” Kiara says, shoving the door of the fridge with her hip. “Ready whenever you are.” 

John B heads towards the door, grabbing his backpack from the floor and slinging it over his shoulder. Kiara follows him to the end of the dock, trying not to think too hard about the fact that she’s about to be back on the HMS Pogue for the first time in months. The name written on the side of the boat seems to mock her. She remembers the day JJ had painted it on, hanging off the side of the boat, nearly upside down, with a can of paint and a brush. Since then, there’s been countless trips jetting around the marsh, long days fishing and sitting in the sun on the boat.

Jesus. Maybe she should have just accepted the three mile trek back to her house.

John B hops into the boat first, then turns and holds a hand out to help Kiara in. She accepts it, jumping in with both feet and sending the boat rocking violently for a second. 

“Oops,” Kiara says when John B nearly topples over. John B smiles a little, shaking his head. 

“Typical,” John B’s voice is almost fond, and Kiara can’t help but break into a huge smile.

John B turns from her after a second, approaching the helm of the boat, and Kiara heads to the bow of the boat. 

“Can you just drop me off by the Wreck?” Kiara says, sitting down. She knows John B’s already running a little late, and bringing her all the way home will only make him later. The public dock by the Wreck is probably on the way to whichever Figure Eight dock John B’s working on, and John B won’t have to go out of his way to go all around the island. 

“Oh, actually, I’m heading to Tanneyhill,” John B says, and Kiara freezes at the sentence. 

_Definitely should have taken the three mile walk home._

“Oh, really? Kiara says, her voice tight.

“Yeah, I’m working on the _Druthers._ You might be seeing more of me around.” John B’s words have a little bit of pride in them, like he’s content with the fact that someone in the Cameron family has deemed him _worthy._ Kiara knows the feeling. 

“Oh, that’s cool,” Kiara says, her mind reeling. She really doesn’t want to bring up the fight with Sarah in their first real conversation in months. There’s no way to broach that subject without making it seem like she’s only crawling back to the Pogues because she has nowhere else to go. Honestly, from the outside, that’s exactly what it looks like. But she also doesn’t see a way she can avoid it. John B can be oblivious, or he can be a dog with a bone. Kiara gets the sense that in this case, he will be the latter.

“Are you good, Kie?” John B says, turning the key in the ignition to start up the boat. “You kinda look like you’ve seen a ghost.” 

“Yeah, I’m fine,” she says too quickly. “But, uh, you can just drop me off at the Wreck.” 

John B quirks an eyebrow up. “You sure? Your _bestie_ is gonna be mighty disappointed."

Kiara snorts. “Doubtful,” she says, and John B’s visible confusion only grows. Kiara finally sighs, shrugging her shoulders. “Sarah and I aren’t really friends anymore.” 

_If we ever were,_ she’s tempted to add. 

John B’s face is blank for a second. “Oh, shit. Seriously?” 

“Yeah,” Kiara nods. “Seriously.” 

“Like… not friends this week or not friends ever again?”

Somehow, John B’s question makes Kiara feel worse. He doesn’t even know Sarah, and he understands how flighty she can be. It’s a wonder Kiara’s even surprised by the downturn of their friendship when everyone else could see it coming from a mile away. 

“Not ever again, I guess,” Kiara clarifies. “She’s not who I thought she was.” 

“Did something happen?” John B gets the boat moving, turning it towards the part of the marsh that gives way to the sound. His voice may be casual, but his shoulders are tense. “Should I be kicking someone’s ass?” 

Kiara breathes out a laugh that sounds far sadder than it has any right to. “No, it’s my fault.”

John B’s quiet for a second, and he nods. “You don’t have to take all the blame, Kie.” 

They putter away from the dock, slow enough that Kiara can still make out his words. She raises her voice to be sure he can hear hers.

“Not all of it,” she admits. “Just a majority of it.” 

John B looks her straight in the eyes before flicking them back to the open water. “We all made mistakes,” he says. Somehow, it’s clear that they aren’t talking about Sarah, anymore.

John B clears his throat, breaking the uncomfortable silence. “The dock by the Wreck, you said?” 

Kiara nods. “Yeah, that’d be great.” 

John B doesn’t say anything else, just pushes the throttle to inch the Pogue a little bit faster. Any other conversation would be lost to the roar of the motors, so Kiara pulls her knees up to her chest as the rest of the island flies by.

When she jumps off the boat and onto the dock, Kiara waves back at John B with a smile and watches him take off with a mock-salute. It isn’t lost on Kiara that John B didn’t actually accept her apology today. They aren’t back just yet. But it feels like a step in the right direction. 

  
  


\--------

  
  


When John B gets back to the Chateau after work, JJ’s already working on his second burger from Kiara’s peace offering. John B expects to have to explain himself, but JJ doesn’t seem surprised at all. 

Still, when he sees JJ at the table with the take out containers, he attempts an explanation. “Kiara came by,” he says, and JJ raises an eyebrow.

“No shit,” he says through a mouth full of food. “I definitely thought you and Uncle T paid for all this food.” 

John B huffs out a breath, collapsing into the chair next to JJ. He should probably go shower – after hours working on the _My Druthers,_ he smells like sweat and fish – but instead he shoves a handful of fries into his mouth. 

“She just showed up here,” John B says, all but ignoring JJ’s statement. JJ freezes slightly, but continues to chew after a second. “She was standing in the driveway.”

JJ swallows. “She called me a few days ago,” he admits, and John B feels his eyes bulge out of his head. JJ studies his burger for a second. “Needed me to pick her up from a party, she was too drunk or whatever. She said she might stop by.”

“Oh, yeah?” John B says, taking that information in. “Wow. I, uh, didn’t know you guys were still talking.”

“We aren’t. I hadn’t really talked to her in months,” JJ says, finally looking up from his burger.

John B picks up a couple of fries, turning them over in his hand before dipping on into the pile of ketchup and popping it in his mouth. “How’s she doing?” John B asks.

Kiara hadn’t been exactly forthright about what was going on in her own life, and despite whatever happened between them, he was curious. He didn’t want to push her to talk about anything, especially when they hadn’t spoken in months, but he’d feel better if he had a sense of what was going on with her. He hopes, maybe, that JJ had gotten a better read of her during their conversation.

“Fine, probably,” JJ says, clearing his throat and dashing John B’s hope of any type of resolution from him. “Rafe was giving her a hard time, but I figure Sarah will take care of that.”

“Uhm, I don’t know about that,” John B says, blinking in shock. “Kiara said she and Sarah aren’t friends anymore.” 

“Oh,” JJ says. John B can almost see the gears turning in JJ’s mind. It looks like he’s realizing something. “Oh, shit.” 

“What?” 

“Nothing,” JJ says quickly, his brow still furrowed in thought. “She just said something when I picked her up and – I don’t know. What happened with them?"

John B shrugs. “She didn’t say. She didn’t even really want to tell me her and Sarah were fighting. She only mentioned it when I told her I was going to Tanneyhill.”

JJ considers that for a second, and then lunges across the table to grab the box of onion rings. He sits back down, vague concern still on his face, but then he shrugs it off.

“They’ll probably get over it,” he says, shoving a couple of onion rings into his mouth. “Typical Kook shit.” 

“I’m not sure.” John B leans over, steals an onion ring from the box for himself. “She definitely doesn’t think so.” 

JJ pauses again. “You think she’ll, uh, be around more often?” he asks lowly. He shakes his head, reconsidering the question. “Do you even want her to?”

John B’s taken aback. A few hours ago, he could have answered both questions with certainty, a resounding _no_ to the both of them. He’s still not sure if she’ll be around more often, or if this was a one-off thing to clear her conscience or whatever. As for whether he wants her around anymore – that’s become even murkier. He hasn’t really thought about it, didn’t really anticipate it would be a possibility. It seemed so out of the question, he hadn’t even considered whether he _wanted_ her to come back. She’s been gone for months, and they definitely didn’t part on the best of terms. 

And yet, his last conversation with his dad still lingers in the back of his head. Calling it a conversation is the understatement of the century – it was definitely a fight. The first few weeks without his dad, he had been angry, and he had survived on that anger alone. 

Now that the fire has faded, John B just wishes his dad would come back already so he could talk to him again. He still believes his dad is out there, somewhere – he has to be. John B can’t imagine that being the last time they talked, can’t live with those angry words being their last. It’s inconceivable, and John B knows the world is cruel, but it can’t be _that_ cruel. If there’s one thing he never wants to repeat, it’s the feeling he’s had the last couple of weeks.

“Yeah, I think I do,” John B finally says, surprising himself. “I mean, it’s not like she said she’s coming back or anything,” he adds quickly.

“But if she does?” JJ prompts.

John B sighs deeply. “I don’t want to lose any more people,” he says, struggling to express himself. “Over stupid shit, you know."

“Stupid shit?” JJ says, astounded. “JB, she _abandoned_ us.”

“Yeah, which fucking sucks,” John B concedes. “But life is fucking short, and none of us are guaranteed anything. We all make mistakes, and Kiara going to the Kook Academy was always going to be difficult–” 

“ _Difficult_ does not lead to _complete betrayal_ , last time I checked.”

John B levels JJ a look.“You talk a lot for someone who ran to pick her up from a party as soon as she called.” 

JJ grumbles, shoving another couple fries into his mouth. “That’s _so_ not how it went.”

“I’m calling bullshit,” John B’s quick to say, and JJ quirks an eyebrow up at him.

“Alright, Mother Theresa.” John B throws an onion ring at him, which he catches effortlessly in his mouth. JJ sends him a sideway glance, chewing his mouthful. “So I guess that’s that, then. You’ve already welcomed her back?” 

“Like I said,” John B deflects. “I’m not even sure if she’s coming back.” 

“Jesus Christ, it’s all about the technicalities with you,” JJ says, rolling his eyes. He waits for a second, and when he speaks again, he’s quieter. “The least she could do is, I don’t know, _apologize_.”

John B fiddles with the corner of the take-out box. “She kind of did today,” he says.

JJ waits for John B to elaborate, but when he doesn’t, JJ throws his hands up. “ _Kind of?_ How do you _kind of_ apologize?” 

“We didn’t exactly talk it out.” John B’s steadily avoiding JJ’s gaze, but he doesn’t need to see him to know he’s rolling his eyes at him.

“Okay, and?” JJ blurts out, crossing his arms.

“And she said she was sorry,” John B answers, leaning back in his chair and running his hand through his hair. JJ’s got a tight lipped smirk on his face that doesn’t promise anything good.

“ _She said she was sorry,”_ he mocks. “Alright, bro, sorry for what? Sorry for abandoning us for the Kooks? Sorry for showing up to the Boneyard with Rafe? Sorry for being MIA when your dad’s _literally_ lost at sea?” John B hits him with a look, and JJ immediately retreats, putting his hands up in surrender. “Got it, too far. But you know what I mean.” 

“I don’t know, JJ,” John B says, tilting his head to the side. “Maybe all of the above?”

JJ scoffs, throwing a napkin back at the table. “Right, all of the above,” he says sarcastically. “So, what, that’s it? You’ve already forgiven her?”

John B gestures to the feast in front of them. “Well, she did bring food,” he tries, unconvinced.

“That’s all it takes with you?” JJ reaches out, grabbing a box at random and shaking it. “A couple of burgers and a box of onion rings?”

“You seemed to enjoy the apology burger.” 

JJ scowls at the uneaten half of his burger still in his hands. He sets it down before he addresses John B again. “JB, man…”

He sounds frustrated, and John B’s beginning to think that, for once in their lives, JJ actually wants him to take something seriously. It’s a mildly terrifying thought. 

“I don’t know, man. I just…” John B runs a hand over his eyes and takes a deep breath. “I just want to know why, you know?” 

JJ’s face is almost scarily blank when John B dares to look his way, and his stomach goes all funny for a moment. He tries to tell himself it’s a result of all the onion rings he just ate, and _definitely_ nothing else.

He sits up a little straighter, sets his shoulders under JJ’s incredulous glare. “I just want to know what happened, I guess,” John B says. “Or why everything went down the way it did. I mean, you know Kiara. She wouldn’t have just up and abandoned us.”

“And yet, she did,” JJ deadpans. 

“Look, all I’m saying is, she’s got to have an explanation.” 

JJ looks stunned at him, his eyebrows so high they disappear under his hair. “So she can roll in with any half-assed excuse to match her _kind of_ apology and you’d be happy?” 

“Okay, look. This is going to sound morbid,” John B warns, and JJ hits him with a funny glare, but then gestures for him to continue. 

John B takes a second to form his thoughts, and when he can’t get them in any working order, he just blurts it out. 

“If either of us died tomorrow, I’d want Kiara to know she was my best friend.”

“ _Jesus fucking Christ,”_ JJ groans, running his hand through his hair, sitting back in his seat. 

“If she’s ready to apologize, I’m ready to hear it,” he says. He holds his hand out to JJ expectantly. “Pogues for life, right?”

“This is the most morbid handshake ever,” JJ declares, but he still reaches out and slaps their hands together in the Pogue handshake. 

“You asked for it, bubba,” John B says. “But I’m serious.” 

“Seriously unhinged,” JJ counters. 

“You get it, though, right?” John B says hesitantly.

JJ’s quiet for a minute, and John B bites the inside of his cheek. For some reason, John B can’t imagine fully cutting ties with Kiara. Not anymore, at least. Even if they’ve all said things they didn’t mean, even if there’s been months of silence, the truth is that Kiara’s been like family to him for the last five years. Whatever happens between the four of them going forward, nothing can change that.

“Yeah,” JJ finally says. “Yeah, I get it.” 

John B lets out a heavy sigh. He’s relieved, but also not all that surprised – if there’s one person he hoped would get it, it’s JJ. When he feels cornered, JJ has a tendency to lash out in anger, to dig his heels into whatever grudge he is holding. But JJ is also a bundle of unflinching loyalty, even to people who don’t always deserve it. He’s the last person who would ever turn his back on a friend, even one who hurt him as much as Kiara did.

“Anyways.” John B clears his throat, shifting a little on his seat. “I should probably go shower.”

JJ kicks back his chair, so he can slap his hand on John B’s shoulder. “I support that, bro,” he teases, “Gotta scrub those emotions away, right?”

“Something like that,” John B says absentmindedly. 

He spares a look to JJ, who has apparently put aside his animosity towards the Wreck’s food and is back to working his way through the rest of his burger – not a care in the world. John B would be fooled, possibly, if he didn’t know him as well as he does

“Right, okay, shower.” John B pushes back his chair and makes a start towards the bathroom.

“Hey JB,” JJ calls after a second, and John B turns to look at him. “You know I got you, right? Like, whatever you decide. Either way. If Kiara starts coming around again… I could be cool with it. And if she doesn’t, also cool.”

John B nods his head, shooting finger guns at JJ. “Noted.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> annnnnnd the next chapter is: "The Answer to Reconcilation: Even More Hamburgers"


	23. The Answer to Reconcilation: Even More Hamburgers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's a Christmas Eve miracle!! I hope everyone celebrating has a phenomenal Christmas!! 
> 
> Thank you to my amazing beta reader [lemon_drizzle_cake](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lemon_drizzle_cake/pseuds/lemon_drizzle_cake) for helping me figure out how surfing works (kind of) and for working on this chapter even though everything is so hectic right now! <3

Following the article about Big John’s disappearance, JJ, Uncle T, and Pope don’t leave John B alone at the Chateau if they can help it. It’s kind of an unspoken rule – they don’t have any sort of active schedule to babysit him – but he notices. John B sees Uncle T slide his eyes towards Pope when he says he has to do a grocery run, or casually ask JJ if he plans to stay the night when he scrounges up some odd weekend jobs. 

John B finds it vaguely stifling to be under 24/7 surveillance, but mostly he just thinks the three of them are going overboard. It’s like they are waiting for him to implode at any given moment. 

Pope is always the least inconspicuous about it – JJ and Uncle T will mill around the Chateau, giving John B some space, but Pope always has something planned. A few weeks ago, they had a _Star Wars_ marathon. Last Tuesday, he dragged John B into helping his dad with a grocery run. Today, he had planned to go surfing while JJ and Uncle T were at work, but his phone rings before they even get out the front door. 

He picks up with a worried expression that only increases as the call goes on, and John B already knows what’s happening. 

“Uh, my dad needs help with a last minute delivery, man,” Pope says as he clicks his phone off, shifting his eyes around the empty Chateau before looking at John B.

“Sounds good, man,” John B says, flopping onto the couch. “We can reschedule.” 

“You can tag along, if you want. My dad won’t mind,” Pope says, but John B immediately brushes him off. This is his first chance at solitude in weeks.

“You know what, man?” John B says. “I think I’m good. I’m kind of tired, anyways. Might take a nap.” 

“Are you sure?” He says, and then he waits a second. “I can call JJ.” 

John B rolls his eyes. “Yeah, miraculously, I also have a cell phone,” he retorts. “I’ll give him a ring, see if he wants to go surfing later. Don’t worry, man.” 

Pope accepts that, even though they both know JJ’s working all day – some event or another at the hotel. Pope nods once, looking around the Chateau again. His phone starts ringing again, and he sighs loudly. 

“You’ll call me if you need anything?” Pope asks, and John B gestures for him to get a move on. 

“Yeah, yeah, if I need a babysitter, you’ll be the first one I call,” John B confirms, and Pope looks at him. 

“I’m serious, John B.” 

“So am I! I’ll call you or JJ if I need anything.”

Pope hardly accepts that, but his phone is ringing again, and he looks desperately at the door. 

“Alright, I’ll see you tomorrow,” he says, all but sprinting out the front door and across the backyard. 

John B has no intention of calling JJ, or anyone else for that matter. He’s been surrounded by his friends and Uncle T for weeks, he could take a minute to himself.

Forty five minutes later, John B’s a ball of nervous energy. He’s beginning to think Uncle T has a point – being alone in the Chateau isn’t proving to be the relaxing afternoon John B had anticipated. He tries watching a show, and then cleaning the kitchen, and then taking a nap. For some reason, he can’t sit still or relax. With no one there to distract him, it’s like every corner of the Chateau is a reminder of his dad. His picture on the wall, the locked door to his study, his coffee mug by the sink. 

John B tries to put up with it until he literally can’t stand it. He goes out to lay down in the hammock, hoping to catch a break, and he realizes that being out of the Chateau helps somehow. The further away from the Chateau he gets, the easier it is to breath. He decides to keep moving, his feet carrying him away from the house without any real destination in mind. 

Or, he tells himself he doesn’t have a destination in mind. Maybe he really didn’t, at first. But as soon as he hits Main Street, he knows exactly where he is going. 

Especially in the summer, the Wreck exists in a constant bubble of the smell of french fries and burgers, fried clams and coleslaw. It’s subtle when walking down the street, and impossible to miss the closer you get to the front door. 

He enters the dining room of the Wreck with his hands stuffed in his pockets, surveying the crowd of people to find Kiara’s head. He’s not even sure she’s working, but if he knows Kiara, she’s taking every shift she can manage. It’ll get her mom off her back about social debutante shit that Kiara probably wants nothing to do with anymore. 

He doesn’t see her right away – the Wreck is bustling with a few families and a handful of other customers. It’s not quite the lunch rush John B’s sure they got earlier in the day, but it’s enough to keep the wait staff busy. 

He’s peeking his head around the corner of the counter when none other than Mike Carrera blocks his line of sight. 

“John B,” Mike says, his voice surprised, but still more agreeable than he’s heard it in years.

John B stands up just a little bit straighter. He knows he’s not the Carreras’ favorite person, and he’s always known where he stood in that regard. Now, though, a year of complicated drama with Kiara and a newspaper article circling the island detailing his dad’s mysterious disappearance – well, everything is a little bit different. John B can tell, because Mike has the same kind of awed tenderness to his voice that everyone on the island seems to direct at him now. 

“Mr. Carrera,” John B greets him back, reaching out his hand. Mike shakes it a little too vigorously, like he’s trying to convey to John B all the sympathy he can’t express verbally. “It’s good to see you.”

“Yeah, yeah, you too,” Mike says, and John B tries not to laugh. It’s probably just about the first time in history that Mike might actually be happy to see him. “Why don’t you have a seat? I can whip up something for you – shrimp and grits, right?” 

John B’s about to open his mouth and tell him that he’s fine, that he doesn’t need anything, when Kiara comes out of the kitchen, her hair matted to her forehead under her headband and her arms laden down with two trays of food. 

“No, Dad,” she says in an exasperated voice, like she can’t believe her father would suggest such a thing. “JJ’s order is shrimp and grits. John B likes the double bacon burger.” She pauses for a second as she bumps the swinging counter door open with her hip. “Right?” She confirms, looking at John B. 

“Uh, yeah,” John B says, kind of in shock. “But there’s no need for you to make anything for me, sir. I’m fine.” 

Mike hits John B with a look. “Sit your ass in a chair, boy. I’ll be out with your burger in no time,” 

He claps him on the shoulder and scoots around Kiara and her multiple trays, disappearing into the kitchen. 

Kiara nods her head to the trays. 

“Give me a second?” 

“Yeah, yeah, no problem.” 

Kiara weaves her way through the crowd of people in the dining room, avoiding the toddlers running loose and stepping over obstacles with practiced ease. Her bun is barely holding itself together, a few pieces trailing down her back in their natural curl, and her arms shake just a little bit when she places the trays down on the holder to deliver the food. John B knows what Kiara looks like after a bad lunch rush, and damn, it must have been one hell of a rush. 

Kiara confirms as much when she makes her way back to the counter, settling herself on the opposite side of John B and nearly banging her forehead to the countertop. She had been all smiles and polite conversation with the family she was serving, but her shoulders sag from exhaustion in front of John B. 

“Lunch rush went well?” John B questions, and Kiara lifts her head up.

“It went well for somebody,” she says, pointing a thumb back to where her dad is standing in the kitchen. “It was 7 tables and a group of middle school Kooks for me.” 

“That’s rough, buddy,” John B says, and Kiara shrugs, standing up and placing two glasses in between them. “I was, uh, going to ask if you could ditch to go surfing,” John B pauses as he looks back on the tables Kiara’s waiting on, “but it looks like you might be busy?”

“Oh, uh–” Kiara says, grabbing a gallon jug of iced tea from the fridge. “I’m on until 7:00 and I can’t really leave my dad hanging.” 

Kiara says it like she’s guilty, but John B waves her off. “Rain check?” John B offers, and Kiara’s face lights up.

“Rain check,” she agrees, sliding one of the glasses to him. He lifts his up, tilts it towards her, and she taps her own glass to it lightly. Kiara smirks, lifting her glass up to her mouth and gulping most of it down in one go. John B grins back at her as she wipes her mouth with the back of her hand. 

“Just stop by the Chateau whenever,” John B says, lifting his own glass to take a sip. 

“Absolutely, yeah,” she says, nodding. “I’m free on Saturday?” She poses it more like a question, but John B just shakes his head. 

“Come on, Kie. You know better than to try to schedule something with us.” 

Kiara freezes a little, but she recovers quickly. “Yeah, yeah, you’re right,” she says, grabbing a towel and wiping down the counter in front of him. “I’ll, uh, just drop by? Sometime?”

“Sounds like a plan to me.”

“Cool,” Kiara says causally, but her face breaks into a giant smile. John B thinks that, maybe, things aren’t as far off as they seem. 

“Alright, kid, one bacon burger and a load of fries,” Mike says, emerging from the kitchen and sliding a plate in front of John B. “And I don’t mind you chatting, Kie, but table 4 is having a moment.” 

Mike points to the table in question, a set of parents and their three toddlers causing general mayhem. As Mike gestures to them, the youngest of the kids, a child who couldn’t be much older than a year old, picks up a fork from the table and sends it clattering to the floor. 

Kiara sighs, picking up a fork from the silver tray. “I’ll go deal with it,” she says to her dad, and John B waves two fingers at her, already halfway into his burger. “You need anything else?” she asks before she heads back to the tables. 

“Nah, I’m good,” John B says, shoving a fry into his mouth. Kiara considers him for a minute, then shoots a look at her dad. 

“He’s gonna want onion rings in a minute,” she says before turning away. 

“No, I’m good-” 

“I already got them heating up.” Mike says, almost dejectedly.

\---------

John B spent the rest of his time at the Wreck scarfing down another plate of onion rings and sprinkling in a few fractured conversations with Kiara. It felt weirdly normal, like they were back to their old selves for an hour or so. He had to leave at some point, running out the door with a goodbye thrown over his shoulder and a demand to see her soon. 

So, Kiara finds herself outside of the Chateau, but this time she’s not quite as nervous. Now, instead of feeling like she wants to throw up, she feels vaguely excited. The nerves are still there, but they are good nerves, like anticipation. 

“Text me when you are done! And make sure it’s before four!” her dad calls out the window of his truck, and Kiara rolls her eyes but agrees. He has reminded her no less than twelve times since she asked him to drive her to the Chateau. 

She still doesn’t know what to make of her parents' feelings on the Pogues. Sometimes, she could swear they both have a soft spot for the three boys. JJ and John B had come into the Wreck at separate times, and her parents had both reacted in the exact same way: throwing plates of food at them and acting exceedingly more polite than Kiara could have imagined. But then, when Kiara asked for a ride to the Chateau early Saturday afternoon, her father had immediately pulled a face. 

Kiara knows her parents are aware that something has tanked her social life – in the past few weeks, she has only been out of the house for work and the one party at Max’s. Her mom has tried to broach the subject multiple times, asking Kiara why Sarah hasn’t been around lately, but Kiara shut that down as quickly as possible. In no uncertain terms, she told her mom that Sarah won’t be around anymore.

She didn’t miss the concerned look her parents had shared after she said that, or the way neither of them brought it up afterwards. Maybe that was why, despite his initial resignation, her dad agreed to help her get her surfboard in the back of his truck and drive her to the other side of the island. 

He still looks like he might not be sold on the idea as he backs out of the driveway. 

Kiara feels far more at ease. She lays her surfboard against the side of the house, hopping up the steps of the porch to knock on the door. 

“John B!” She calls out when she gets no response. She pushes the door open slightly, poking her head into the Chateau. “John B, are you here?”

“Uh, no,” calls a voice from the pull out couch. JJ flips around on the bed until he’s facing Kiara. “What the fuck?”

“Hey,” Kiara says awkwardly, her confidence in her plan plummeting in the blink of an eye. 

JJ rubs the sleep out of his eyes, looking up at her from the pile of pillows. “Is that Kie?” 

“Yeah,” Kiara says awkwardly. “Sorry to wake you up.” _Even though it’s well past noon,_ she wants to add, but she doesn’t. New boundaries and all.

“It’s all good,” JJ says, his voice thick with sleep. He stretches his arms above his head, a little bit of his bare chest poking out from under the sheet he’s tangled in. “John B got called to work, some emergency on the Camerons’ boat.” 

Kiara sucks in a breath at the mention of Sarah’s family, and JJ looks at her quickly, with a hint of understanding in his eyes. She’s inexplicably relieved when she realizes JJ and John B must have talked about the separate interactions they had with her.

Instead of bringing up her visceral reaction to the richest family on the island, JJ looks her up and down, taking in her skin guard. “You guys had a surfing date?” 

“Not really,” she admits, propping the door open a little more. “I just, uh, wanted to see if anyone was up to catch some waves.” 

JJ lifts his head up a little, his eyes immediately going to the coffee maker that’s half full. “Give me ten minutes?” 

“Really?” Kiara says, her heart soaring a little bit. 

“Yeah,” JJ says, but then he hesitates. “Unless, you don’t want...”

“No! No, yes, of course –” Kiara says, stumbling over her words. She hadn’t expected JJ to want to go surfing with her. “I’ll, uh, be waiting by the hammock?” Kiara points a thumb behind her. 

“Sounds like a plan,” JJ says, stretching some more. Kiara nods once, stepping out of the Chateau and hopping down to the hammock.

\-----------

“You’re a little out of practice, Carrera,” JJ says, lifting himself to sit up on his board. Kiara’s nearly out of breath, paddling behind him, and she flips over on her board, staring up at the sky. Her surfing trip a week or so ago has nothing on JJ’s breakneck pace – she’s horribly out of practice and her lungs are reminding her. She had forgotten how much energy JJ could expend before he even seemed slightly fatigued.

“Fuck off, JJ,” Kiara says, too exhausted to remember that she’s still on thin ice with the boys. “I’m keeping up with you.”

The surfing trip started off in dead silence, both of them walking to the beach hardly saying a word to each other. But then, once they were in the water and rode a couple waves, they fell into something that felt both familiar and entirely new. Comfortable enough to poke fun at each other, anyways. Kiara tries not to think too much of it. 

“Only because I’m going easy on ya, Kie,” JJ says, the smirk evident in his voice. “I gotta slack off a little so you don’t pass out and drown.” 

“Fuck. Off.” Kiara repeats, moving to flip over on her board and sit up. “I can go for another wave right now.” 

JJ raises an eyebrow at her, but otherwise doesn’t move. Even with a decent wave building behind him, he makes no move to catch it. Kiara doesn’t want to admit that she’s thankful.

It’s silent for a second before JJ speaks again. “So, you ever gonna tell me why I had to break you out of a Kook party last weekend?” he asks quickly, like he’s ripping a bandaid off, and Kiara’s entire body tenses up. The wave that was building behind them passes, and even though it’s gentle it almost tosses Kiara off her board. 

“You didn’t have to _break in,”_ Kiara corrects, her brain still reeling to keep up with the conversation. She definitely wasn’t expecting JJ to drop that question in her lap – nor to be that direct.

JJ brushes her off. “Don’t shortchange me, Kie,” he says, teasing. “I had to break into Max’s house, guns a-blazing–”

“The day you _ever_ get your hands on a gun is the day everything goes to shit,” Kiara says, kicking her legs a little in the water to turn her board to face him. In response, he splashes water at her. 

“Ye of little faith.” 

“Ye of little brain cell.” 

JJ splashes her again, but he hits her with a look that lets her know he hasn’t forgotten his original question. Kiara sighs.

“I knew I shouldn’t have gone,” she says instead of truly explaining. “If the Kooks didn’t like me when I started at the Academy, they _hate_ me now.” 

“But – why?” JJ asks, rubbing at the back of his neck. “I mean, you and Sarah –” 

“Sarah and I are not friends,” Kiara says sharply, trying and failing to measure her tone. JJ puts his hands up in defense, but he hits her with another pointed look. He doesn’t drop it, or move the conversation forward. Finally accepting that he’s not going to, Kiara shakes her head, resigned. “She tricked me into thinking we were friends. And I fucking believed her.” 

“Bitch move,” JJ offers, and he looks for a second like he wants to say something else, but ultimately decides against it. 

“Yeah,” Kiara says, hesitant. She’s been sitting with her guilt for so long, and with just her and JJ and the water, it feels almost too easy to keep talking now that she’s started. JJ’s always been simultaneously the easiest and the hardest person to talk to – she could talk to him about anything, and he would be receptive and understanding and nonchalant about it, even if he hardly ever took anything seriously or opened up in return. Maybe that’s why she can’t stop herself from voicing what’s really eating her up inside. 

“Sometimes I feel like I deserve it, though.” 

JJ looks at her like she has three heads, and then immediately flicks his gaze to the shore. “That’s dumb,” he says. “You definitely don’t deserve it.”

“You say that, but...” Kiara says, and she takes a deeper breath. Her heart rate is finally starting to settle from the strenuous activity, and now she’s hiking it back up by having an _emotional conversation_ with _JJ Maybank._ “Like – I don’t know,” she says, chickening out at the last second. 

JJ’s still not looking at her. He doesn’t say anything, just sits there in silence waiting for her to figure it out. 

“Sometimes I think that Sarah’s ditching me the same way I ditched you guys,” Kiara blurts out in one breath, so low she half-hopes he won’t hear her over the sound of the waves. “Like, this is the universe’s way of teaching me a lesson, or something. You know?”

JJ’s head whips around to look at her, an eyebrow raised. “Uh, no, actually, I don’t know. Kie, that’s insane.” 

“Am I wrong, though?” 

“About the universe being out to get you?” JJ balks. “Jesus Christ, I hope so.” 

“No, I mean...” Kiara trails off. 

JJ breathes out a humourless laugh, shaking his head. It doesn’t make any sense to her. How can he be so dismissive of the idea that this is her payback? After all the shit she pulled on them?

“So, what, you don’t believe in Karma?” she asks. JJ snorts. 

“Hell nah, Kie. That’s your hippie-crystal shit,” he says, and Kiara rolls her eyes. She only has a few crystals, and she’s only brought them to the Chateau _once_.

“Ye of little faith,” Kiara says, teasing JJ with his own words from earlier. 

“Plus, if Karma were real,” JJ says, his voice suddenly dropping to a serious tone, “there’d be a long line of people ahead of you waiting for theirs.” 

“Yeah, maybe,” Kiara says, because she doesn’t want to disagree with him anymore. She doesn’t even know if she wants to have this conversation in the first place – it’s treading on dangerous territory already, and honestly, she’s not here to convince JJ he should still be furious with her. Even if, you know, he should be. 

“I'm gonna be real with you, Kie,” JJ says suddenly, and Kiara’s a little taken aback, her eyes automatically switching to him. JJ’s fiddling with his fingers, and she’s not exactly excited for where this new branch of the conversation could go. "I know you ditched us, and that fucking sucked, man. But all this talk about Karma, and retribution... it's complete bullshit. It's not even the same thing. Like, you're here all mopey while Sarah Cameron is probably at the Island Club Brunch or something."

Kiara’s stomach twists painfully. A few months ago, Kiara would have been at the Island Club brunch, gossiping with their friends and trying to swipe a few mimosas.

“I can’t believe I was ever friends with her,” Kiara says, only then realizing how much she means it. Kiara had to change so much about herself and her life to fit Sarah’s worldview, it’s almost unthinkable. Now, standing on the other side of the disaster, Kiara’s acutely aware of how painful it was to squeeze herself into a cookie-cutter mold she was never meant for. 

JJ looks at her for a second, then nods his head. “You had your reasons,” he says quietly. “Did what you had to do to survive.”

Kiara thinks back to the early months at the Academy, when JJ found her at her lowest point, when she was so miserable she couldn’t see a path forward. She knows that’s what JJ’s thinking back to, still worried about her even months later. She wants to tell him that she’s better now, that somehow, throughout all of this, she’s found some solace in herself, but she doesn’t want to lie to him. Whatever solace there may be, she hasn’t found it yet. She’s hoping it’s close, though.

“I could have dealt with it better,” Kiara admits, and JJ nods. 

“Yeah, that’s probably true,” he finally says. “But, like… we could have, too.” 

Kiara shakes her head, snorting. “I don’t know, only one of us became friends with a pit viper.” 

JJ looks at her sideways. He seems pensive for a moment, hesitant.

“So, that’s really it?” he asks. “Like, between you and Sarah? You guys are done?”

“Yes,” Kiara says, her voice steady. “I’m done with her.”

JJ nods at that. “This isn’t, like, some Kook thing? You guys aren’t going to fight for a few days and then go back to being best friends?”

It’s almost sad, how well the boys can see through the bullshit, and how long it took Kiara to come to the same conclusion. “No, definitely not,” Kiara says, and then adds, almost dejectedly, “there’s nothing left for me there.” 

“So, what now?” 

“I don’t know,” Kiara admits. They both sit with that for a second, Kiara fidgeting with the sleeve of her skin guard and JJ avoiding her eyes. He stares out into the horizon, his eyes squinting in the bright daylight reflecting on the water. 

“You should talk to John B,” he finally says, taking her off guard. He glances towards her, then, piercing blue eyes boring into hers. “Like, if you wanted to come back… you should start by talking to John B.”

Kiara nods, swallowing thickly. Leave it to JJ to read her so well. It’s not lost on her that he’s offering her an olive branch of sorts, something she couldn’t even bring herself to ask for out of fear of rejection. And yet, here they are.

It’s silent for a beat. JJ finally twists his lips into a little smirk, points a finger behind himself. “There’s a perfect set of waves coming.”

Kiara turns around to see two waves approaching them in rapid succession, and returns a tentative smile. “Let’s go,” she says, flopping down onto her stomach, ready to paddle out. JJ hesitates for a split second before grinning back at her and mimicking her movements.

JJ motions for Kiara to take the first wave, and she paddles out before him, catching the wave and standing up precariously. She loves when she hears JJ shout from behind her, and she fails to catch her balance when her concentration breaks. She falls backward into the water, coming up and sputtering water a second later, just in time to see JJ speed by her, letting out a loud _woop!_ Kiara laughs loudly as he falls back off his board. 

Kiara clambers back onto her board, paddling back out past the break point. By the time JJ catches up with her, Kiara’s winded again. Like before, riding the wave had dispelled any awkward tension between them – most likely because JJ gets far too much enjoyment out of Kiara’s exhaustion. 

“Need a break already?” JJ teases, and Kiara turns her board to face the shore. 

“No,” she says defiantly, but JJ takes one look at her and sits up on his board, all but deciding that both of them are taking a break. Kiara grumbles as she sits up herself. “I’m fine.” 

“Could have fooled me,” JJ says, and Kiara closes her eyes and tilts her head towards the sun. She doesn’t want to see the smirk on JJ’s face.

“This is your plan?” she challenges. “Get me all tired from surfing and then force me to talk about my feelings?” 

“Feelings? God, Kie, who do you take me for? I’m learning the Kook secrets, getting all the inside information.” 

“Yeah?” Kiara says, her eyes still closed. “Pretty sure Caroline Van der Worker could have given you all the _inside information.”_

It takes Kiara a second to realize what she said – she’s not even sure why she brought up Caroline’s name. She wasn’t thinking as she said it, it just slipped out. Her eyes fly open, and she snaps her head to look at JJ. 

JJ looks confused at first, but after a second, understanding dawns on him. 

“No shit, she told you about that?” His face breaks into a shit-eating grin, and Kiara wants to curl up and die. 

“Please, please forget I said anything,” she nearly begs, and JJ bursts out laughing. 

“I didn’t know I had a Kook bragging about me,” he says, mildly amused. Maybe a little proud of himself. Kiara wants to vomit. “That’s new, holy fuck. Not that I would brag about her, you know. Respect for women and all that, plus she was kind of sloppy –” 

“Please! Stop! Oh my god, I do not want to know what Caroline is like in bed,” Kiara groans, falling back on her board and almost flipping over. She seriously considers diving under water and disappearing from this conversation for the rest of eternity. The only thing that keeps her on her board is the knowledge that she’s still out of breath and she might not even make it to shore. Even if she did, she knows JJ is the stronger swimmer, and he’d probably meet her on the sand with the same smirk on his face.

“Jesus, Kie,” JJ says after a second. “I didn’t know you were so jealous. If you wanted a piece of JJ Maybank, all you had to do was ask.” 

He finishes his sentence with a wink, and Kiara doesn’t really know what to do with that. JJ’s always been slightly flirty, just a little bit cocky, but she’s not used to this new, brazen attitude he has acquired. He’s still JJ, at the end of the day, but now he’s got some experience to back up his confidence and it makes for a deadly combination. 

“Fuck off,” she tells him, because it’s the only response she can think of. JJ laughs again, and Kiara relaxes a little. 

“John B’s gonna lose his shit when I tell him _Caroline Van der Worker_ is bragging about me,” JJ says, and Kiara rolls her eyes. 

“She’s not _bragging_ about you, she’s – nevermind. I’m done talking about her.” Kiara checks her watch, hoping to change the subject, and she sighs when she realizes it’s creeping dangerously close to 4:00. “My dad said he’d have to pick me up at four.” 

JJ’s still grinning like an idiot, but he nods his head. “One last wave and then we head back.” 

“One last wave,” Kiara agrees.

\------------

One last wave turns into three more waves, and then Kiara and JJ are all but sprinting back to the Chateau to make it there before her dad. She knows her dad’s going to be punctual, because she’s not at Tanneyhill, and she really doesn’t want to piss him off on her first trip back to the Chateau.

She rounds the corner of the driveway, sighing in relief when her dad’s truck is missing. “God,” she gasps out, once again out of breath. “That was close.” 

“Damn, Carrera, I didn’t know you could run that fast,” JJ says, coming to a stop next to her. He’s significantly less winded, once again, and Kiara wants to scream. She really needs to up her cardio game to keep up with the boys again. 

“I wouldn’t have had to run that fast if you didn’t keep insisting on _one more wave,_ ” she points out, dragging her board over to the side of the house. 

“Those last two waves were _beautiful,_ you know we couldn’t miss them,” JJ points out, and Kiara rolls her eyes. He’s right, but she doesn’t want to admit it. She’s about to retort, but another voice interrupts her.

“What are you doing here?” 

Kiara whips around to see Pope standing on the stairs of the Chateau, looking between her and JJ. 

“Hi, Pope,” she says hesitantly, and Pope ignores her almost completely, instead turning to JJ. 

“We, uh, went surfing,” JJ explains, scratching the back of his neck. Pope’s eyes narrow when he turns back to Kiara. 

“I can’t believe you had the nerve to show up here,” Pope says, slamming the door to the Chateau open and stomping inside.

Kiara’s emboldened by whatever little headway she’s made with JJ – she’s about to follow Pope into the Chateau, to force him to talk to her, when her dad pulls into the driveway, honking his horn. 

_“_ __Shit,_ ” _Kiara breathes out.

“I’ll deal with Pope,” JJ says automatically, and Kiara looks at him, starting to protest. “Your dad seems to be in a rush,” he cuts her off, pointedly nodding towards the truck. 

Kiara hesitates another second, long enough for her dad to hop out of the cab of the truck and call out her name. 

“I got this,” JJ promises, then tilts his head towards her dad. “Don’t piss him off.” 

“Thanks, JJ,” Kiara says, and she means it. She turns around and heads for the truck, and by the time her and her dad get her surfboard into the bed of the truck, JJ’s already inside. Kiara can make out the faint sounds of an argument coming from the living room, and she’s morbidly curious about what they are saying. She hesitates for a second, but before she can properly make any sense of what she’s hearing, her dad reminds her that he has to be at the Wreck in half an hour, and she quickly hops into the cab of the truck. 

It’s silent in the car as her dad pulls out of the driveway. Kiara’s still focused on trying to make out what’s going on inside the Chateau, but the boys have gone into the living room, disappearing from her sight. Kiara sighs and slumps down in her seat.

Her dad looks over at her once he’s on the road, an eyebrow raised. “You look pretty down,” he says, and Kiara shrugs. “You have a good time out on the water?” he tries again.

“Yeah,” Kiara says, and she’s telling the truth. “Yeah, I did.” 

  
  
  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> annnnnd the next chapter will be: "Reinstating The Pogue Lyfe T-Shirt Company"


	24. Reinstating The Pogue Lyfe T-Shirt Company

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello! It's been a hot minute, hasn't it? For some reason, this chapter was really, really hard for me to write, and I'm not entirely sure why. I don't anticipate the rest of the chapters giving me the same problems. So, good news: it don't think it'll take me this long to get a chapter out again. Hopefully. 
> 
> Thank you to my amazing beta reader [lemon_drizzle_cake](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lemon_drizzle_cake/pseuds/lemon_drizzle_cake) for all her help with this chapter and for allowing me to freak out about politics with her (again)

Kiara’s legs burn as she pedals as fast as her legs will take her, whizzing by the streets of the Cut. Her breath is coming in short puffs, but still she pushes her legs to take her faster, whipping around the turns of the street and nearly taking out a handful of middle schoolers. 

When her phone rang earlier, she was barely awake. It was supposed to be a lazy Saturday morning, and her shift at the Wreck was still a few hours away. Her plans for the morning consisted of staying in bed until her mom dragged her out for breakfast, but the sound of JJ’s ringtone shattered any hope of that.

Kiara takes the last turn into the Chateau’s driveway too fast, and she flies towards the house like a bat out of hell, her bike tires spraying gravel in every direction. JJ’s on the front steps already, waiting for her.

“What’s going on?” Kiara says, hopping off her bike while it’s still hurtling forward.

“Kie, chill, chill,” JJ says, getting up to meet her – hands stretched in front of him to stop her. Kiara’s bike clatters to the ground as she looks frantically around the Chateau. Honestly, from JJ’s tone on the phone, Kiara half expected the house to be on fire, but there’s no immediate signs of damage.

“You said it was an _emergency!”_ Kiara gasps out, still trying to catch her breath.

JJ winces at that, like he’s only just realizing that he could have worded it better. “I said a kind-of emergency.” 

“A _kind-of_ emergency?” Kiara says incredulously, still a little out of breath and pissed off that she busted her ass to get to the Chateau for what’s probably going to amount to nothing.

“Nothing’s happened yet,” JJ says, and Kiara rolls her eyes. She’s not even sure if she wants to hear the rest of what JJ’s going to say. Then JJ looks back at the Chateau, and he drops his voice just a little bit. “But John B’s spiraling, man.” 

Kiara’s anger leaves her as fast as it came. “What do you mean?” 

At first, JJ just sighs. She can practically see the gears turning in his head, and she gives him a second of contemplation. Finally he shrugs, giving her a pointed look. “He got a call from an unknown number.” 

“Wait… That’s all?” Kiara says, quirking an eyebrow up. JJ had certainly built it up to be something, and she’s not too impressed by the payoff.

“He thinks it was his dad.” 

For a second, Kiara’s brain shuts off. She can’t even process what JJ just said. Then it’s like her brain has a hard reboot, and a million thoughts come rushing in at once. 

“ _What?”_ she asks, her voice raising a few octaves. “Big John called? What did he say?” 

“Nothing,” JJ says after a second, turning his back to the Chateau. He sounds defeated, like it’s painful for him to get the words out. “The line was silent.” 

“Silent?” Kiara questions, turning this information over in her mind. “What do you mean?”  
  
JJ shrugs, running a hand through his hair. “JB says he heard breathing on the other side, but…” he throws his hands up in frustration.

“But… he thinks it was Big John?” Kiara says tentatively, and JJ nods.

“He’s convinced.” 

“Could it be?” It takes a second for Kiara to even get the words out – to even let herself hope – and when she does, her voice is shaky and uncertain.

“Kie…” JJ says, and Kiara can already see that this is not the line of questioning JJ needs right now. He looks frazzled, his tone exasperated. “It’s been months.”

Kiara steels herself. Whatever’s going on inside the Chateau is too big for JJ to handle alone, and that means something. JJ has always been the best at dealing with John B – whether it was talking him down or hyping him up. The two of them got each other like no one else, and if JJ was calling in backup – well, it must mean he’s at the end of his string.

“Is he okay?” Kiara nods her head up towards the Chateau.

“No, he’s fucking not,” JJ says.“He’s going through old phone books trying to find the number.” 

Kie can already tell where this is going. “No luck?” 

“Nope,” JJ says, popping the ‘p’. “No such number in Kildare County as of yet.” 

“Did you try calling it back?” 

JJ hits her with a look. “Of course,” he says. “No answer.”

“Alright, well, have you tried Googling it?” Kiara says, and JJ looks at her silently for a minute, obviously answering her question. “ _Typical,”_ she mutters. 

Leave it to the boys to forget about the largest search engine in the world when they’re trying to play private investigator. Kiara takes a step forward, ready to go into the Chateau and sort everything out, but JJ puts one of his hands up again to stop her. 

“And....” JJ pauses again, like he’s trying to figure out how to word his next sentence. “Pope’s inside.” 

Kiara pauses – she senses something in JJ’s tone that is suddenly making her much more tense. 

“Okay,” she says hesitantly, nodding slightly.

“Just be chill.”

It’s not exactly a warning, but Kiara can tell from his tone that Pope won’t be happy to see her. Whatever argument JJ and him had a few days ago, it didn’t resolve Pope to be any more welcoming. 

It kinda makes Kiara want to run in the opposite direction. 

Instead, she takes a deep breath. John B needs her. She can deal with this. 

“Alright, I can do that,” Kiara says, nodding towards the house so JJ knows she’s ready for whatever is about to happen. “Let’s go.”

JJ nods, a little more hesitant than Kiara is used to seeing him. Still, he turns on the balls of his feet and makes his way back to the front door, holding it open for Kiara behind him. 

Kiara’s a big believer in auras and energy and all that, and – well, when she follows JJ around the corner into the kitchen, the vibes are just _off._ Across the way, in the living room, John B’s perched on the edge of the couch, flipping through one of the multiple phone books he has spread around him. 

She can practically feel Pope’s glare snap to them, and she knows JJ notices too. JJ tenses, and then he turns back to the living room with false zeal. 

“Look who I found hanging around!” JJ says, his voice far too earnest to be taken seriously. If the scenario had been any different, she would have expected Pope, or maybe even John B, to call him out on it. But as it is, John B's barely paying attention - he has his nose buried in one of the phone books, his finger trailing down the column of numbers. 

“Hmm?” John B hums, before he lifts his eyes from the book and sees Kiara. “Oh. Hey, Kie.” 

His voice is kind of distant, like he isn’t really paying attention to what’s going on. Before Kiara can even reply, he’s back to staring at the page in front of him. 

“What’s the number again?” he asks, not bothering to look up but clearly directing the question to Pope. 

Kiara shifts her gaze to Pope, and she finds that he’s not looking at John B, either. He’s staring – more like glaring – at her, and JJ shifts just a little bit in front of her. 

“Hey,” Kiara says awkwardly, almost an automatic reaction to try and dispel the awkward air around them. It doesn’t help – in fact, it may make it worse. Pope doesn’t respond other than to scoff at her and turn to John B. He recites the number to John B, who continues flipping through the pages and repeating the last four numbers over and over again. 

JJ turns back to look at Kiara, his eyes betraying just a little bit of concern. On the other hand, Kiara knows that she must look like a deer in headlights – all wide eyes and frozen in place. 

A second later, John B slams the book shut and tosses it off the table. “Not in that one, either,” he says, running a hand through his hair. “God damn it.” 

He doesn’t sound quite hysterical, but it might be bordering on it. JJ jumps into action, turning fully to Kiara and backing a little further into the living room. “You, uh, said something about Googling it?” 

Kiara’s still kind of at a loss for how to deal with the situation in front of her – it’s not _completely_ out of the ordinary, seeing as John B is just looking through a phone book, but there’s something in the air. Something that makes it feel like they are all on the brink of something, and a wrong step in any direction could drop them into a tailspin. 

Kiara takes a few tentative steps forward, avoiding the floorboards that creak the loudest, before settling herself down on the edge of the coffee table. 

“What’s the number?” she asks quietly, pulling her phone out and unlocking it. There’s a few beats of silence before Kiara looks up at Pope. Pope won’t meet her eyes, and he doesn’t lift the hand holding John B’s phone. 

“Pope?” John B croaks out, looking up at him, but Pope just shakes his head, looking at JJ. 

“You had no right–” 

“Give her the fucking number, Pope,” JJ says through gritted teeth, and Pope glares back at him. For a second, it seems like they may be stuck at an impasse, like an immovable object meeting an unstoppable force, but John B’s voice snaps out. 

“Give her the number,” he says, breaking through whatever weird standoff JJ and Pope were about to have. Pope immediately looks at John B, like he’s trying to decide how to handle him. Finally, Pope sighs, and lifts the phone up and reads the numbers off the screen in a cold tone. 

Kiara’s not much of a private investigator herself, so her first instinct is to type the number straight into Google and see what comes up. She hopes it may be an easy match, but after a few minutes of fruitless scrolling and a few pointed sighs from Pope, she gives up hope on that front. She finds one of the less sketchy reverse number search websites, auto filling the payment information with the credit card her parents gave her. She hopes and prays she won’t end up having to give them an awkward explanation for this particular charge.

It takes a second for Kiara to type in all the information, but eventually, she gets her answer, and a little bit of unease settles in her stomach. 

“I, uh…” she trails off, breaking the silence of the Chateau and kicking up the tension a few hundred notches. “I found it.” 

The boys all snap to attention. Pope and JJ had been pacing, appearing to be part of a silent argument that Kiara could only imagine was about her, but they stop moving when she speaks, both turning to look at her with the same anxious expression. John B is still across from her, his hands stilling around the pen he was fiddling with. It’s the only indication that he heard her at all. 

“What? Is it him?” JJ asks, and Pope reaches out, smacking his arm on JJ’s bicep. 

Kiara’s kind of surprised by that – outside, JJ had been pretty adamant that he didn’t believe Big John was alive. Now, JJ seems as invested in the answer as anyone else – maybe even more than John B, who’s still silent on the couch. Even Pope, who won’t look her in the eye, is tapping his foot, his arms crossed tightly across his chest and his eyes flitting back and forth across the room. All telltale signs that he’s nervous. 

Kiara doesn’t know how to let them all down. She swallows thickly, trying to determine how to word this revelation. “It’s, uh, a telemarketer,” she says finally. “From an insurance company in California. It’s been getting a lot of negative reviews lately.”

The Chateau is silent for a second. If they were on a precipice before, Kiara’s pretty sure she can hear them plummeting down from that cliff. JJ sucks in a breath. 

“Are you sure?” John B’s voice is so calm, it’s unnerving. The kind of calm that is less than a step away from losing it completely.

“I mean –” Kiara starts, but she’s cut off. 

“Are you sure?!” John B yells, losing that tentative hold on himself that he had before, looking at Kiara with crazed eyes. Kiara jumps in shock – he looks so unlike John B that she almost can’t believe it.

“John B, man, chill out,” JJ says, his tone somewhere between stern and concerned. He takes a step towards John B, but Pope blocks his path. 

“Don’t defend her–” 

“I’m not defending her!” JJ shouts at Pope, trying to shove him away. “I’m trying to help John B.”

“You’re trying to help John B?” Pope says incredulously, crossing his arms. “How is _any_ of this helping John B?” 

Pope waves his arms around the Chateau, but his gaze lingers a second too long on Kiara and she knows that she is exactly what he’s talking about. Frankly, Kiara’s starting to agree with him. She doesn’t understand how her being here could possibly help John B – she doesn’t seem to be doing any good, other than starting a fight and breaking John B’s heart. 

Pope and JJ are still caught up in each other, and Kiara is lost in her thoughts, when one of the phone books finds its way through the air, colliding with the wall in the kitchen. Kiara cringes at the sound of it crashing into the wall, flinching away from John B, but he doesn’t even notice. JJ and Pope both whip around to face John B, and the three of them stare at him for a second, waiting for the explosion. 

John B doesn’t make a move to reach for another phone book, or any of the other items around him he could potentially throw. He’s still kind of breathing heavy, his head hanging down to the ground. 

Kiara sees, out of the corner of her eye, Pope glancing at her one more time before he turns around and storms out of the Chateau. Before the door to the Chateau shuts, Kiara’s on her feet, ready to follow him out, but JJ stops her. 

“Yeah, no, that’s a fucking terrible idea,” JJ says, his voice softer than his words. “You need to talk this one off a cliff.” JJ points to John B. “I’ll deal with Pope.” 

He doesn’t wait for her confirmation, he just turns around and heads out the door, following Pope around the yard. Kiara supposes it’s for the best. There’s only one way a conversation with Pope could go at this moment – neither of them are in any space to resolve their troubles calmly. That’s the last thing that would help John B, which is Kiara’s number one concern at the moment. 

Even if she’s not entirely sure what to do, or how she’s going to do it, she’s gotta try. With a deep breath, she turns around to face John B. 

\-----–––––

JJ’s heavy boots make a distinctive sound on the gravel as he drags his way across the driveway. Pope doesn’t turn around as he approaches – but still, JJ is sure he knows he’s coming up behind him.

“How could you call her?” Pope says, his back is still to JJ,

“I don’t know, man. How couldn’t I?” JJ retorts. He’s come to match Pope’s position – both of them standing and staring out at the water, refusing to look at each other. 

“It’s actually really easy, you could have just left your phone in your pocket,” Pope deadpans.

JJ bites his tongue down, shaking his head. “We were out of options, Pope, in case you hadn’t noticed. And she’s clearly helping. Unless you have a better idea–” 

“I do have a better idea!” Pope snaps, finally turning to look at him. “Leave her out of it! We can deal with this on our own, just like we’ve _always_ done before!” 

JJ laughs humorlessly. 

“Oh yeah. Because that worked so well so far. Like last time, when he drank half a bottle of vodka–” 

“Since when has that bothered you? You aren’t exactly the epitome of sobriety yourself.” 

“Well, this time, Uncle T isn’t around. John B and alcohol poisoning plus a missing guardian – you do the fucking math.” 

That causes Pope to pause for a second, but it’s short lived. “We could have handled it without her,” he insists. 

“Yeah, maybe. Or maybe John B would have ended up in foster care,” JJ says, his voice harsh. “You don’t have to like it, Pope, but you gotta put up with it. John B has forgiven Kiara and she’s in there helping us.” 

Pope narrows his eyes at JJ. “John B doesn’t seem to be the only one who’s forgiven her.” 

JJ runs his hands through his hair, gripping it tightly in his hands. “Yeah, and so what if I have?”

Pope’s eyes bug out of his head – clearly, he hadn’t expected JJ to admit it so readily. “So, what, she comes back and you guys just… accept it? Like she didn’t literally disappear for a year?” 

“Haven’t we lost enough people, this year?” JJ nearly growls. “Hasn’t John B? I’m not going to be the one to force him to lose another one.” 

There’s a challenge to JJ’s voice, and Pope scoffs when he hears it. “You think she’s good for John B? What about when she gets bored and leaves again? When she runs back to Sarah Cameron?” 

“She’s not going back to the Kook Princess.” If there’s one thing JJ knows, it’s that. Whatever happened between them, the hurt on Kiara’s face was clear enough. She couldn’t even bring herself to talk about it. There’s no way she’s ever going back. 

Pope shakes his head. “When she jumps ships and John B’s spiraling again, that’s on you.” 

JJ sticks his chin in the air. He’s confident that won’t happen, and he’ll accept that challenge. “We’ll just have to see.” 

Pope turns away from him. “Yeah, I guess we will.” 

Without another word, Pope walks away, heading to get his bike and leave the Chateau. JJ makes no move to stop him, just listens to the spray of gravel as he pedals out of the driveway. 

Jesus, JJ hopes Pope is wrong. 

\-----––––-

“You’re sure?” John B says again, and Kiara sighs. 

“John B–” 

“Are you _fucking positive?”_ he implores, and Kiara wants to hang her head in her hands. She’s seated next to John B, waging an internal war with herself about whether she should reach out and give him a hug or not. Physical affection is the love language of the Pogues, but Kiara doesn’t know where she stands with them now. 

“I’m positive, John B.”

She is – she has shown him the website, the report she paid for that clearly showed the phone number belonged to a telemarketing company. It’s pretty indisputable evidence that it wasn’t Big John, unless Big John had moved to Fountain Valley, California and took up a part time gig as a cold caller. She would have made a joke about that, but the way John B’s acting – well, she’s kind of afraid he might believe her. 

John B takes a deep breath, collapsing in on himself. 

“I could have sworn it was him,” John B says, hanging his head. His voice sounds watery, like he’s trying not to cry. “I swear, I could have… I heard him, Kie. Like, I knew it was him.”

Kiara doesn’t know what to say. She has no idea how to deal with any of this. Part of her wants to pull John B into a hug and let him cry it out. The other part of her wants to run far, far away. 

She ends up compromising – she reaches a hand out, tentatively laying it on John B’s back. When he doesn’t flinch away, she takes it as a good sign and starts rubbing her hand in a circle. She hopes it feels comforting. 

“I feel like I’m going insane,” John B finally admits, letting out a humorless laugh. “JJ and Pope look at me like I’m nuts. But I just – I can’t help it. He’s out there somewhere and he’s going to try and get in contact with me.” 

“They’re just worried about you,” Kiara says gently. “They don’t think you’re crazy, John B.” 

John B scoffs. “Yeah, they do.” Then, quieter, he adds, “You probably do, too.” 

“John B, you know I don’t think you’re crazy,” Kiara says, with almost enough attitude to constitute an eyeroll. John B snorts out a laugh. “I don’t!” Kiara insists. 

“So you think he’s alive? My dad?” John B challenges, and the question stops Kiara in her tracks for a second. 

Kiara doesn’t know what she believes. She’s thought about it, of course, ever since she saw that headline months ago _._ She had assumed, originally, that it was one of those things that people never came back from – a death sentence, of sorts. But now that she is starting to fight her way back into the good graces of the Pogues, she finds herself leaning more and more into the hope of the situation. Maybe Big John will come back, maybe everything will go back to normal. Maybe everything will work out just fine. 

“It’s possible,” Kiara says after a little bit of a pause. 

“That sounds convincing,” John B says sarcastically. 

Kiara shakes her head. “You don’t need to convince me, John B. I’m already on your side.” 

“Yeah?” John B says, looking up at her, almost shy. Kiara nods her head. “Bringing a little hope to the Chateau?”

“That’s why I’m here,” Kiara says, trying to fake a cheerful attitude. It’s only after the words leave her mouth that she realizes how bad it sounds. John B stiffens a little next to her, and Kiara wants to eat her own words. “I mean – that’s not, like, the reason I’m here. I’m here for you, and I know –” 

She’s rambling, and John B has enough mercy to cut her off. “It’s cool, Kie.” 

Kiara takes a deep breath. “No, it’s not,” she says, trying to find a way to convey her feelings. She can’t find the words – maybe they don’t exist in the English language – so she settles for something she should have said a while ago. “I’m so sorry, John B. For everything.” 

John B finally looks up, taking a second to search her face as if he’s trying to figure out exactly what she’s apologizing for. He clearly gets the wrong impression, because he shakes his head. “It’s not your fault.” 

“No, John B,” Kiara says, a little more firmly. “I should have been here for you, these last few months. I shouldn’t have gotten caught up in the bullshit.” 

John B’s silent for a long moment, and Kiara tries her best not to start rambling again. She doesn’t want to drown out John B’s own thoughts. 

John B shakes his head at her, lost in thought. “What happened with us, Kie?”

Kiara guesses that maybe, subconsciously, she should have seen this coming – and yet his words knock the air out of her for a moment. John B has always been the one looking for answers, even when they didn’t exist. And he deserves to know, now, even if Kiara herself could barely make sense of where her head had been the last few months. 

“I wish I knew, too,” she finally says, a mere whisper.

She had planned an apology – it was far more eloquent in her head than when she blurted it out a few moments ago. She had promised herself she wouldn’t bring up any excuses, wouldn’t try to justify her actions. Maybe Kiara had her reasoning or her explanations for what she did, but she didn’t want to bring any of that into her apology. She did something shitty, reasoning be damned. 

But now, for better or for worse, John B was asking for an explanation, and she had no idea what to say. 

“I think it’s more about what happened with me,” she says to him after a minute. “I got caught up in all the shit – my parent’s expectations and everything.” 

“Your parents always had expectations,” John B points out. His voice isn’t harsh, but the reminder makes Kiara recoil a little. 

“Yeah,” Kiara relents, fiddling with her fingers. “But when it came to the Academy – at a certain point, it was just easier to play into them, you know? They always wanted me to be friends with Caroline and Olivia and…” Kiara trails off, unable to get Sarah’s name out of her mouth. “I never wanted to be one of the debutante girls, but it was so much easier to pretend to fit in with them. At the Academy.” 

John B nods, but he doesn’t say anything. Kiara hesitates, giving him enough time to interrupt if he wants, but he stays silent. Kiara takes that as a cue to continue.

“And then everything just, like, fucking spiraled. It was like – for the first time in my life, I wasn’t fighting my parents every step of the way. I could do whatever I wanted with the Kook girls and my parents would just be fine with it. And instead of fighting them, and fighting at school, I just kind of... went along with it. Took the easy way out.” 

John B nods with more understanding than Kiara expected out of him. “That makes sense,” he says, quiet. Kiara takes a deep breath.

“But, like... I shouldn’t have bailed on you guys. I tried to balance it all at first, I really did, but I just – I couldn’t figure out how to do it.” She sags into her shoulders, goes back to staring at her nails. “It’s a fucking lame excuse, I know, but it’s all I got.” 

“I get it, Kie,” John B says, like he really wants Kiara to know it. “It sucks, but I get it.” 

Kiara could have probably left it at that – she’s not sure if John B got what he was looking for, but he’s definitely giving her an out. Still, Kiara’s trying to make both herself and John B understand, so she presses on. 

“And then, like.” She sends him a tentative look, buries her gaze in her lap once again. “Then the Boneyard happened.”

John B scoffs, and she whips her eyes back at him. “The Boneyard,” he repeats, and for a brief moment hurt flashes through his eyes. And maybe something else, too. Something like regret.

“Uh, yeah.” Kiara clears her throat. “I thought – god, I don’t know what the fuck I was thinking. But I really wanted to try, you know? To make amends, to… I don’t know. I guess _that_ turned out real well.” 

John B chuckles under his breath. “Yeah, well, that was a low point for all of us.” 

“I didn’t mean what I said, you know,” Kiara says softly. “I just lashed out because I felt cornered. I didn’t expect to get in a fight with you guys, and then when I did, I panicked. I said whatever I knew would hurt you the most.” She looks straight into his eyes, determined to convince him she’s telling the truth. “Sarah was never a better friend than you guys were.” 

It seems so fucking obvious to Kiara, but John B looks back at her with sheer confusion plastered on his features. 

“What the hell happened between you two?” he finally asks her.

Kiara doesn’t answer right away, her face screwing up into a scowl. She shakes her head, says, “I don’t know. I think… I think I always knew it was going to end. Even when we were still friends, I knew it wasn’t going to be a forever thing. And I wanted to reach out to you guys, believe me, I did. Especially when I heard about your dad…” 

“But you didn’t.” 

It’s harsher than he’s been the entire conversation. Kiara sucks in a quick breath. “I thought I would only make it worse.” 

“Kie, you weren’t ever going to make it worse. It was already the worst.” 

“I’m sorry I wasn’t here,” Kiara says, her voice breaking a little. She wills herself not to cry – this isn’t about her, she can’t break down right now. “I should have been here.” 

John B shrugs, his eyes avoiding hers. “It’s cool, Kie. We pushed you away, too. I couldn’t really expect you to come back.”

“I still could have tried,” she says earnestly. She reaches a hand out, places it over his forearm. “We’ve been friends for so long, there’s really no excuse. I should have been here as soon as I heard.”

“Well… you’re here now,” John B says. He rolls his eyes exaggeratedly at her, adds, “Dealing with my crazy theories.” 

Kie steels her gaze, makes sure he takes her seriously. “I don’t think you’re crazy.” 

John B huffs out an uncomfortable laugh. “You might be the only one.” 

Kiara doesn’t really know what to make of that – by John B’s tone of voice, she senses that Pope or JJ (or maybe both of them) haven’t exactly kept their doubts about John B’s theories quiet. 

She’s so lost in her thoughts she doesn’t even realise when John B puts an arm on her shoulders. She lifts her face towards him, eyeing his questioningly.

“Hey, you came back in the end,” he says certainly. “That’s all that matters.”

Kiara wishes it were really that simple. “I don’t know if that’s true.” 

John B nods. “You don’t know, but I do. Fuck, Kie, you don’t get to rake yourself over the coals for this for the rest of your life. Yeah, it was shitty of you to leave. Now make amends and be done with it.” 

“How do I do that?” Kiara asks quietly. “Make amends?”

John B considers her for a moment, and then he leans over, slowly, and rests his head on her shoulder. Kiara lets him, wrapping her arm around his shoulders tentatively.

“This was a pretty good start, I’d say.” 

\---––––––-

Kiara closes the front door of the Chateau behind her, her shoulders only slightly more relaxed than when she entered. She’s not under any illusion that this will fix anything, but it’s the first step to mending the disaster she created. 

She doesn’t know what this means for their friendship. She doesn’t know if they’ll ever go back to normal, or if she’ll ever really be welcome to hang out with them again. She’s under no illusion that she’ll be a Pogue again – she’s pretty sure that boat has sailed long, long ago. But maybe if she’s having a particularly bad week, she could reach out to the boys and go to a kegger with them. 

JJ’s standing on the dock, which kind of surprises her. She was expecting Pope and JJ to be together, wherever they were, but JJ’s ominously alone. 

Part of Kiara contemplates hopping on her bike and zooming out of the driveway to avoid whatever emotional conversation is waiting for her on the dock, but JJ turns around when the door to the Chateau squeaks shut. 

Kiara doesn’t really even consider it, after that – she takes a few steps forward to the dock, and then places herself a few steps away from JJ. 

“Where’s Pope?” she asks after a minute, and JJ shakes his head. 

“He went home,” he says, and he doesn’t explain any further. “Is he good?” JJ asks, nodding up to the Chateau, clearly referring to John B. 

“I mean,” Kiara trails off. “What does _good_ even look like, anymore?” 

JJ laughs at that, a little breathless. “That’s a solid point, unfortunately.” 

Kiara crosses her arms. “Do you think he’s going to be okay? I mean, this whole thing with the call and his dad…” 

JJ looks at her and considers it. “Did he go for the vodka bottle yet?” 

Kiara’s stunned, taken aback. “What? No – he’s inside. He’s getting ready to run a few errands for work.” 

“That’s a good sign,” JJ says, the relief evident in his voice. “Every other time he’s gotten into one of these moods, he’s hit the bottle hard. Didn’t want to risk it with Uncle T off the island.” 

Kiara balks. “He’s… done this before?” 

“Not this exact thing,” JJ says, wringing his hands. “Not the phone number or the phone books, but, like, something like it. He thinks his dad is leaving him clues, and he gets in his head about it. It’s like no one can talk him down.” 

“Well, I mean, can you blame him?” Kiara says, leaning against the railing of the dock. “I can’t even imagine losing my dad, but if I did – I’d do exactly what John B’s doing. I’d never give up on him.” 

JJ doesn’t say anything, and Kiara tenses up a little. She knows Luke Maybank isn’t exactly parent of the year – she’s not sure if she’s struck a nerve or not. Finally, JJ just shakes his head. 

“It’s like he doesn’t care what happens to him or anyone else as long as he finds his dad,” he says. “And it’s been months, Kie. It’d take some insane amount of luck for him to be alive, and that type of luck doesn’t exactly come in spades around here.” 

“So, you think he’s dead?” Kiara can’t help but ask. Other than John B, JJ is the closest to the situation, and she’s desperate to know what he thinks. JJ’s been here since the beginning, and he seems to have his head on straight about the situation. 

JJ doesn’t let her off easy. He shrugs, and then he turns the question around. “What do you think?” 

Kiara’s been struggling with that herself. She had told John B she believes him, and she does. But Kiara can’t tell if she believes him because she thinks it’s the truth, or if she believes him because she _wants_ it to be true. Aside from the obvious fact that her best friend is essentially an orphan, Kiara has her own private reasons for wanting to see Big John again. 

Big John had been like an uncle to her – someone who had protected and cared for her favorite boys, someone who offered food and shelter when he had so little to give. It hurts her deep in her heart that Big John might have died without knowing she was coming back to the Pogues. She hadn’t seen him for months when he disappeared, and if he never comes back – well, he’ll never know that Kiara made amends for the damage she did to the boys she claimed to love. She wants Big John back for a lot of reasons – she wants John B and JJ to have their family back, she doesn’t want John B to have to worry about DCS or Uncle T moving them off the island. She wants the Chateau to continue to be their home, their safe haven on the island. But she also wants to see Big John again so he’ll know she hasn’t abandoned them.

Kiara takes a little too long to respond, but finally she comes to the only reasonable answer she can think of. “I don’t know what I think, really,” she says. “But it’s a possibility.” 

_If I can come back, so can Big John._

“I don’t know, man,” JJ says, his tone far from convinced. 

“It’s fucked up,” Kiara offers. 

“You can say that again.”

It’s silent for a few seconds as Kiara tries to think of how to move the conversation forward, but she’s saved from that struggle by her phone alarm. The ringing reminds her the reason she was leaving the Chateau in the first place – her shift at the Wreck is starting soon. 

“Oh, shit,” Kiara says, already turning around to head towards her bike. “I gotta go, I have work.” When she turns to look at JJ, he nods, throwing up a two finger wave. “You good? With him?” 

“Yeah,” JJ says, glancing over Kiara’s shoulder. “I can handle him. No problem.” 

Kiara nods, taking a step further towards her bike. “You’ll call me if you need me?” 

JJ smiles a little bit. “Yeah, yeah, I’ll keep you updated.” He pauses for a second. “Don’t be a stranger.” 

Kiara doesn’t know what to make of that, but she nods, before turning to get her bike from the side of the Chateau where she threw it. 

\----–––––

Later that night, when she finally gets home after a long shift at the Wreck, Kiara’s emotionally and physically exhausted. The last thing she sees before she turns her phone off for the night is a new notification.

_John Bee Routledge added you to his group chat, “The Pogue Lyfe T-Shirt Company.”_

Today has been a lot – Big John, the proximity to her boys, her own reckoning with everything that’s happened in the last few months. The resurrection of the group chat feels like the straw that breaks the camel’s back. A sob bubbles up in her chest, and she covers her mouth with her hand. She didn’t know how relieved she would feel seeing the group chat back in her phone, but it feels like an unofficial invitation. She can hardly believe it. 

It’s not the old group chat – all the years of messages they had before are gone, and in its place is a blank slate, an empty chat without any conversation. It’s sad, in a way, to start a new chat without the years of memories, but it also feels like a fresh start.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> annnnnnd the next chapter will be: "A Gold Plated Invitation Or Whatever"


	25. A Gold Plated Invitation Or Whatever

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ANOTHER TAYLOR RELEASE????? this fic has *literally* lived through three of them at this point akdjflaksdfj someone sedate me. thinking of renaming this fic pogue lyfe t-shirt company (taylor's version) in solidarity. 
> 
> also, lowkey, we are getting so close to the end of this, it feels surreal. I don't know what to do with myself.
> 
> as always, thank you to my lovely beta reader [lemon_drizzle_cake](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lemon_drizzle_cake/pseuds/lemon_drizzle_cake) for all her help with this chapter!! Sara, you are a godsend <3

_The Pogue Lyfe T-Shirt Company_

**_Jonathan James Maybank_ **

_anyone down to surf today? waves are wildin_

**_John Bee Routledge_ **

_hell yeah, I’d be down_

**_Pope Heyward_ **

_I’ll be at the Chateau in fifteen._

  
  


The messages stare back at Kiara from her phone, almost like they are taunting her. 

It’s been nearly a week since she was last at the Chateau, witnessing John B’s breakdown up close and personal. Nearly a week since she’d been added back to the chat. 

As of yet, she’s said approximately nothing. 

To be fair, there wasn’t a lot to comment on. Most of the conversation revolved around JJ sending memes, or John B asking where his sweatshirt was, or Pope responding that said sweatshirt was left on the bow of the HMS Pogue. 

She’s like a spectator in the group chat, watching on from behind some barrier that may or may not actually exist. There’s no clear, easy way to reintegrate herself. She can’t just respond with a thumbs up emoji to JJ’s lame meme. 

She also can’t start the conversation. She can’t hop back into the chat after months of silence and be like _hey, anyone want frood from the Wreck?_ A small part of her almost feels like it was a mistake to join the group chat again, like it just compounds all of the distance between them, making it even more obvious. 

An even smaller part of her blames John B. To be completely fair, she’s not really in any position to blame John B for anything at this point. She’s pretty sure that ship sailed a long, long time ago, and it’s not coming back to port anytime soon. But still – he added her back into the chat before she even had a chance to finish her apology tour. Sure, John B had forgiven her, and maybe even JJ, but Pope could hardly stand to be in the same room with her, much less have a conversation. Being in the chat now feels weird and misplaced when she is pretty sure a significant portion of said chat wants nothing to do with her.

Kiara doesn’t know how to move forward, and she sure as hell doesn’t want to go backwards. Instead, she just kind of hangs in the balance, watching but not participating and trying to read between every line. 

Whatever the case, she’s fairly certain that these messages aren’t even meant for her. It’s an invitation, but she’s not sure she’s the intended audience. A voice in the back of her head keeps telling her that they forgot she was in the group chat, or that JJ sent the message to the wrong one. Kiara’s certain the boys have another, separate chat for the three of them, and JJ just crossed wires and fucked up and all three of them are breathing sighs of relief that she’s not marching down to the beach with them. 

It’s probably all some kind of disastrous misstep, and Kiara’s okay with that. As much as she wants to grab her board and meet the boys at the beach, the truce between her and the Pogues is tenuous at best. In fact, there’s not a truce to speak of between Kiara and Pope.

So, with ⅔ of the group an unknown quantity in Kiara’s mind – and the other ⅓ on shaky ground at best – she decides that she can sit this one out. It might suck, but if it helps repair their relationship in the long run, Kiara’s willing to do it. And honestly, she doesn’t want to think too much about it. It sucks to think that she’s missed so many surfing sessions, and it’s only made worse the fact that now she _knows_ what they are up to. Maybe if she didn’t know they were going surfing, she wouldn’t be thinking about them so much. 

But unfortunately, that’s not how it goes, and she needs something to distract her. Distractions are in short supply around the Carrera household, and Kiara has to settle for helping her dad clean up from Saturday Morning Waffles. 

“You have any plans today?” her dad asks in the hesitant way her parents have begun to nudge her. It’s a fair question – it’s not directly about the Kooks, or her friends, or her social life – and Kiara can’t fault them for being curious. But even so, Kiara knows the questions are just a vague cover for their worry, and Kiara kind of resents that. 

“Nope,” Kiara responds, like she’s responded every time for the last few weekends. 

Kiara’s lived with her parents long enough to sense when Mike’s working up the courage to ask a question that he thinks is gonna have a complicated answer. He stays silent for a second, drying a bowl and setting it on the counter like he’s bracing for impact. 

Both him and Kiara are saved from the fallout of that terrible decision by the ringing of her cell phone. 

Kiara sets the plates in her hands on the counter. “I gotta get that,” she says quickly, and Kiara doesn’t miss the way Mike’s shoulders drop in relief. He waves her off, nodding. 

Kiara grabs her phone, disappearing into her room to answer. She already knows who’s on the other side of the phone – JJ had made her change his ringtone to the sound of an air raid siren several years ago – and if she weren’t literally looking down a _I’m worried about you, hun_ conversation with her dad, she might have been too in her head to answer the phone. In this case, she’s so thankful to get out of the kitchen, she doesn’t even consider it. 

“Hello?” Kiara answers once she closes the door to her bedroom. Immediately, she’s thrown back to the last time JJ had called her – out of breath and kind of freaked out, asking for back-up. That day had been emotionally draining, and she’s not excited to see what disaster the boys might be spiraling into where they needed her again. 

“Kiara Carrera, are you working right now?” JJ says, his voice far more jovial than the pit in Kiara’s stomach was expecting. She blinks in surprise, stunned into silence by the fact that JJ sounds completely at ease. 

“Um, no,” Kiara says, a wittier response eluding her in her shock. 

“Do you have some urgent matter to attend to?” JJ says, speaking with a faux-pretentious air to his voice. 

“Uh, no, I don’t.” 

“Then why, in the ever living fuck, are you not at the beach with us?” JJ says, and she can hear the grin in his voice. 

“I, uh,” Kiara’s mind spins, and she can’t come up with a better excuse. She ends up just blurting out the truth. “I didn’t think I was… invited.” 

JJ makes a sound like he can’t believe her audacity.

“Alright, what are they teaching you at the Kook Academy? Do you need a personal invitation? _Kiara Rose Carrera, would you please do us the pleasure of –”_

“Shut the fuck up,” she says, but her face breaks out into a small smile and JJ falls into a fit of giggles. 

“Seriously, though. I put it in the Pogue chat,” JJ says casually. He pauses for a second, then he speaks again, his tone teasingly accusatory. “Do you already have us muted? That’s a bitch move, Kie.” 

“No, I don’t have the fucking group chat muted,” Kiara says, her smile fading. “I just thought… I don’t know. I thought it might be a Pogues-only thing.” 

“Well, yeah, it is,” JJ says, as if it’s obvious. “And this is confusing, why?” 

Kiara doesn’t know how to answer. She doesn’t want to sound like she’s whining, or force JJ into a corner by asking if she’s considered a Pogue. He’s hinting at it, but still, Kiara’s hesitant. 

“And I’m invited?” Kiara says slowly, and JJ groans on the other side of the phone. 

“Holy shit, Kie. You are a dense motherfucker. Do you seriously need a gold plated invitation?” 

Kiara rolls her eyes, finally relieved. “Shut up.” 

“Give me three days, I’ll see what I can drum up. Gold’s in short supply.” Kiara can hear the smile in JJ’s voice, can picture it in her mind. 

It doesn’t take Kiara long to make up her mind. “Alright, alright. I’ll be there in ten minutes.” 

“Make it five or we eat free at the Wreck!” JJ says, and then he hangs up before Kiara can argue. 

“Asshole,” she mutters under her breath, but her smile is bigger than it’s been in a while. 

But still, there’s a challenge in the air. She can’t lose her first bet back with the boys. 

She throws on a bathing suit and then trips over her feet as she races down the stairs, hurtling herself through the kitchen and towards the door to the garage. 

“Woah, woah, woah, Kiara,” her dad says, turning around as she flies by. He has a spatula in each hand, his arms covered in soap up to his elbows. “Where are you going?” 

“Surfing with the boys!” Kiara yells, ripping the door open and slamming it behind her. She misses Mike’s shocked expression. 

A second later, she throws the door back open, scrambling inside towards the linen closet. 

“I thought you didn’t have plans?” Mike teases, and Kiara only pauses for a second after grabbing a towel. 

“Plans changed,” she shrugs, smiling wide, before she’s out the door again, running down the street with her surfboard in tow. 

––––-

She makes it to the beach in ten minutes, but only just. She couldn’t have made JJ’s 5 minute challenge if she tried. 

JJ’s the first to see her racing down to the shore, and he lets out a _whoop_ of triumph that John B quickly mimics. 

“Dinner at the Wreck?” he yells when Kiara gets close enough. She pulls to a stop just in front of him, out of breath but smiling. JJ points at his non-existent watch. 

“Dinner at the Wreck,” she concedes, and John B pumps his arm in the air. 

“That’s what I’m talking about!” John B claps JJ on the back. “Alright, losers, let’s get in the water.” 

John B throws up a pair of finger guns at JJ and Kiara, picks up his surfboard, and runs towards the water. JJ flips off his retreating figure. 

Kiara laughs at their antics, carefully setting down her board and her towel, trying to minimize the amount of sand on either of them. There’s a few beats of silence before she stands up, and she looks towards Pope. 

Pope had been silent so far, unzipping the cover on his surfboard. He had made no acknowledgement of Kiara’s arrival, instead focusing on ignoring her. Kiara looks over at JJ, but even he’s avoiding her eyes now and she just thinks _great, I’m on my own with this one._ She takes a deep breath, trying not to let it get to her, and tries to seem cheerful. 

“Hey, Pope,” Kiara blurts out before she loses her nerve. JJ tenses up just a little bit, like he’s expecting a fight. That doesn’t exactly settle Kiara. 

Pope sighs, standing up and grabbing his board. He finally looks at Kiara, but he’s completely closed off – there’s not a hint of warmth or kindness in his eyes. 

“Hi,” he says after a second, his voice short. Kiara can tell he was contemplating whether he wanted to respond at all, and Kiara wonders how much of his decision was swayed by the fact that JJ was standing right next to her. 

Whatever his reasoning, he doesn’t wait for her to answer. A second later, he turns towards the water, jogging to catch up with John B. 

Kiara can feel the serotonin high of being invited to surf with the Pogues fading quickly. She mindlessly unzips the cover of her own surfboard, but she’s not even sure she wants to go out into the water anymore. 

“Don’t let him get to you," JJ says lowly, picking up her towel and shoving it into the surfboard cover to protect it from the sand. He zips it up quickly. “He’s just tense.” 

“Pope’s always tense,” Kiara says, only half joking. She turns to watch John B and Pope paddle out into the water. “This is more than tense.” 

JJ sighs, standing up and grabbing his own board. He takes a step or two forward, until they’re shoulder to shoulder, staring out at the water. John B splashes frantically at Pope, and Pope retaliates in turn. “You know Pope. He’ll be pissed at you for a little bit, but he’ll get over it.” 

“Yeah, probably,” Kiara hums, not believing it at all. Out of the three boys, Pope had always been the best at holding grudges.

“C’mon, Carrera,” JJ says, bumping her shoulder with his. He smirks. “You gotta get out of your own head.” 

“You say that like it’s easy,” Kiara says, trying to make her tone light but probably failing. She tries to cover up the awkwardness by starting to walk towards the water, and JJ falls into step next to her.

“It is!” JJ exclaims. “I’m never in my own head, Kie.” 

Kiara tilts her head to the side, sending him a look. “I don’t think you’re making the point you think you are making.” 

JJ brushes her off with a wave of his hand, like he’s making the exact point he intends. “C’mon,” JJ says again, picking up his pace to a jog as their feet hit the water. 

Kiara doesn’t know what comes over her, but suddenly she needs to say _something_ to JJ, clear the air between them, before they paddle out to meet John B and Pope.

“JJ, wait–” Kiara says, standing still in the ankle deep water. JJ’s a few feet ahead, but he pauses and turns back to look at her. 

She doesn’t know what she’s about to say – whether she’s going to apologize or thank him or something – but JJ beats her to it, shutting down her next words immediately. 

“It’s chill, Kie,” he says quickly. “No need to get all emotional on me.” 

Kiara shouldn’t be surprised – this is JJ Maybank, after all, King of leaving emotions out of it when he’s involved. He’ll listen to Kiara rant all day, but the second he feels any sort of empathy or compassion coming his way, he shuts that shit down. It’s so typical of him, Kiara rolls her eyes. 

He waits a second, maybe to see if she’ll argue. “We know you missed us,” he says finally, kicking out his leg to splash Kiara, and Kiara gasps in shock. She moves to retaliate, but JJ’s already taken off into the water, out of her reach.

“Yeah, yeah,” Kiara yells after him. “Maybe I did.” 

––––-

She forgets how annoyingly in sync John B and JJ are. 

It’s been a long day on the water, and Kiara can feel the fatigue coming on. The winds are also starting to change, the water becoming significantly choppier.

Kiara doesn’t want to be the first one to break and go back to shore, but lord help her, her arms are tired and she feels like she might collapse for a nap right on her surf board. She thinks she could be sly about it – if she mentions the Wreck, maybe the boys would be so blinded by hunger that they wouldn’t poke fun at the fact that she _can’t hang._

JJ and John B beat her to it, of course. With one look between the two of them, they simultaneously catch the same wave, leaving Pope and Kiara out on the water alone. 

It shouldn’t be as awkward as it is, but all day, either JJ or John B had been sure to be there as a barrier between the two of them. And not only is it the first time they’ve been alone all day – it’s the first time they’ve been alone in months.

Maybe it’s kind of a dick move, and leaving them out on the water is anything but subtle, yet Kiara can’t help feeling a little thankful. She’s exhausted at this point, and maybe it’s skewing her common sense, but it feels as good a time as any to clear the air with Pope. John B has forgiven her, JJ didn’t even wait for her to apologize, and she has a good feeling about this. Just a little bit of hope that she might not have given her boys credit for how forgiving they are. 

Besides, the whole day of surfing has gone off (almost) without a hitch. Sure, Kiara and Pope haven’t said two words to each other the entire time, but they also haven’t actually fought. Which, given Pope and Kiara’s tempers, is actually something of a miracle. 

Everything is fine with John B and JJ – more than fine, actually. It feels like old times. They gave each other shit all afternoon, poked fun at each other – whatever the boys throw at her, she’s always been able to give back in equal measure. It’s been a great day. Probably the best day in a really, really long time. 

The only thing left weighing on her was her apology to Pope. And the two idiots had given her the perfect out to talk to him. Despite everything, Kiara was hopeful. It felt like, maybe, this was the last puzzle piece falling into place. 

“Hey, Pope,” Kiara starts, cringing at how awkward her words sound as they linger in the silence between them. 

“Don’t,” he says, and he barely turns to look at her. “They might act like everything’s okay again, but this changes nothing. We all know who you are, Kiara.” 

Kiara recoils immediately. Pope’s tone is as cutting and angry as it was at the Boneyard all those months ago. The same type of anger that could put Kiara on the defensive immediately. 

“I’m trying to apologize, Pope!” 

“I don’t care,” Pope says, moving to paddle out with the next wave. “Just, do me a favor, okay? Next time, give me a warning before you split and go back to your Kook friends. Just so I know how much damage control I’m going to have to do with John B.” 

Kiara doesn’t get another word in before Pope starts paddling away, catching a wave and hurtling towards shore. She’s completely stunned, speechless. She doesn’t catch the next wave, or even the one after that. She sits in shock for a second, Pope’s words bouncing around in her head. 

_We all know who you are, Kiara._

By the time she shakes herself from her thoughts enough to paddle back to shore, Pope’s stalking off the beach, and John B’s looking back and forth between the two of them with wide eyes. JJ’s staring at her like he’s waiting for her to explode. 

When she doesn’t offer anything, he clicks his tongue, digging his heel in the sand. “What happened?” JJ asks. 

Kiara can’t even come up with an answer. 

––––-

“We could still go to the Wreck,” Kiara tries, leaning across the counter as JJ moves around the kitchen. 

“It’s chill, Kie,” he says, bending down and opening one of the cupboards. He bangs around a couple pots and pans before producing a beat-up saucepan and holding it up like a trophy. 

Kiara sighs, flopping into one of the kitchen chairs. 

“Is it, JJ?” Kiara laments, attempting to run her hand through her hair and then immediately regretting it when her hand gets stuck in salt covered curls. “The least I could do is fucking feed you guys.” 

JJ doesn’t say anything, just opens a few more cabinets and starts the stove. Kiara crosses her arms on the table, staring blankly at the wall of the Chateau. 

JJ and John B hadn’t mentioned the Wreck when they packed up their surfboards, and Kiara was too busy trying not to cry or scream to remember the bet she had made only hours before. She had only remembered when John B was heading to the shower, and both boys had waved it off when she started apologizing. 

“Alright, Kie,” JJ says after a few minutes of silence. “What the fuck did Pope say to you?”  
  


Kiara scoffs, laying her head down on her crossed arms. “I’m not doing that,” she says firmly. 

“Not doing what, exactly?” 

“Getting between you two!” Whatever's going down with her and Pope, she’s not going to keep dragging JJ and John B into the middle of it. If her and Pope keep fighting like this, and it tears the Pogues up even further, Kiara won’t forgive herself. She’s screwed the four of them up enough. She’s not going to make it any worse. 

Besides, if it came down to it, Kiara knows JJ and John B would side with Pope in a heartbeat. Pope hadn’t ditched them for Sarah fucking Cameron a year ago. 

There’s some more banging around in the kitchen. “Kie, it’s me and Pope. If we aren’t arguing about something, hell will freeze over.” 

Kiara smiles a little at the sentiment, but it still feels wrong. 

“Arguing and fighting are different things.” 

JJ laughs, and she looks over to see him leaning against the counter, crossing his arms. He cocks his head up at her. “Which is this conversation?” 

Kiara pretends to think of it for a second, scrunching up her nose. “A friendly chat.” 

“You are,” JJ sighs deeply, “impossible.” Kiara laughs, and JJ shakes his head a little, moving back towards the stove. He comes back a second later, sitting across from Kiara and sliding a mug her way. 

It’s one of the familiar ones from the Chateau, a mug that’s always in heavy rotation around the kitchen. The design on the side – whatever it had been – is faded beyond recognition from the amount of times it’s been rewashed. It’s precariously filled with hot chocolate, some of it sloshing over the side when Kiara lifts it to her lips. 

In the middle of summer on the Outer Banks, the humidity sits like a blanket around all of them. Even though the sun has started to set, the air is still almost stiflingly warm in the Chateau. It’s not the ideal weather for hot chocolate, but Kiara's only in her bikini and the towel she has wrapped around her shoulders, her hair only just started to dry against her back. The salt water drying on her skin is just cooling enough to warrant a mug of hot chocolate. 

And maybe it’s less about the temperature and more about the familiarity. It’s the same recipe that JJ and John B had perfected long ago, taught to them by none other than Big John himself. The thought puts a little bit of a damper on Kiara’s attitude, but she smiles anyways. It’s nostalgic, a reminder of the thousands of other mugs of hot chocolate she’s drank in this kitchen. 

“Thanks, JJ,” she says after a minute, and JJ nods, sipping his own mug. 

“No problem.”

Kiara hums for a second, takes another sip of her hot chocolate. She mulls a question over in her head for a second before she opens her mouth. “Do you think he’ll forgive me?”

“Pope?” JJ asks, as if there’s anyone else she could possibly be talking about. If JJ’s stalling, Kiara’s ready to accept that it’s a lost cause.

“Alright, so that’s a no,” Kiara sighs, setting her mug back down on the table. “Do you think he’ll ever talk to me again? Or am I gonna be a fucking outcast for the rest of my life?” 

She’s only half joking. JJ kicks her leg under the table. “He’s gonna forgive you, Kie.” 

Kiara looks at him, raising one eyebrow in a challenge. “You seemed suspiciously unsure of that literally five seconds ago.” 

JJ sighs like _she’s_ being the difficult one, running a hand through his hair. It sticks up at funny angles from the salt he has yet to wash out. 

“You know Pope,” JJ says, which isn’t the first time he’s expressed that same feeling. Kiara kinda wants to yell _yeah, and that’s the problem!_ “He’s more stubborn about shit like this. You know, logic or whatever – he’s not big on the emotional shit.” 

“Oh, and you are?” Kiara teases. “Big on the emotional shit?” 

JJ winks at her from across the table. “Ladies love a man who wears his heart on his sleeve.” 

Kiara reminds herself that JJ’s a little more brash than she’s used to. It’s going to take her a while to get used to that. 

“JJ, you don’t even wear sleeves,” Kiara gestures to his bare arms. “You literally cut them off your shirts.”

JJ looks at his arms for a second, as if this is new information. “I don’t like to feel constricted,” JJ says finally. He wiggles his arms dramatically, nearly knocking over his mug. “Gotta keep it loose.” 

Kiara rolls her eyes, but she can’t help grinning back at him. It’s infectious. “Yeah, well,” Kiara says when she looks away from him. “The only thing you’re keeping loose is a few screws.” 

JJ laughs at that one. “What’s that quote from the drug book you made me read in eight grade–” 

“ _I_ didn’t make you read it!” Kiara says incredulously, leaning forward. “It was for English class!”

“Besides the point. What was the quote? Something about, like, all the best people trip balls or whatever.”

Kiara regrets telling JJ that most people assumed Lewis Carroll was high out of his mind when writing _Alice in Wonderland_. Predictably, it had been the only thing he retained from the entire year of English class. Now, JJ and John B exclusively refer to it as _the drug book,_ despite Kiara’s best efforts.

JJ’s still looking at her, as though he fully expects her to come up with a quote from _Alice in Wonderland_ out of thin air. “I, unfortunately, do not have all of _Alice in Wonderland_ memorized.” 

JJ frowns, like he’s thoroughly disappointed. “Shame. It was a good quote.” 

Kiara reaches for the nearest thing to throw at JJ, and ends up with a kitchen towel that’s balled up on the end of the table. JJ bats it away mid-air. 

“Don’t act like you actually read it,” Kiara says, and JJ looks at her in mock indignation. Kiara doubles down. “I know you just watched the movie! The _Disney_ version!” 

JJ cracks a smile. “Tim Burton’s was too long.” 

“ _You’re_ impossible.”

JJ takes that as a compliment, as he does most things. He tips his mug towards Kiara, like it’s a glass of champagne and she just toasted him. “It’s my specialty.” 

Kiara opens her mouth to retaliate, but instead of a witty response, she just yawns.

JJ nods back at the couch. “You want to take a nap? I could disappear so you could, like, zen out.” JJ looks at the towel around her shoulders. “I could also probably find you a pair of sweatpants. A sweatshirt, too, if you’re lucky.” 

Kiara smiles, but she shakes her head. She’s tempted, because she is exhausted, but…

“I gotta get home,” she says. “My parents are gonna be waiting for me. Mike and Anna aren’t any less crazy these days.”

JJ snorts out a laugh at that, nodding. His eyes linger on Kiara’s face a little longer, as if he’s trying to decide if there’s something more to that comment, or if her parents are still the same as always. Kiara smiles to let him know it’s the same shit, different day.

“Shower's free!” John B hollers as he rips open the door to the bathroom, already dressed in pajamas. 

“Hot chocolates on the stove, man,” JJ throws over his shoulder, and John B pauses on the way to his room. 

“It’s 95 degrees out.” 

JJ lifts his cup up. “It’s never too warm to be cozy.” 

John B considers that for a moment. “I… disagree,” he finally decides. “But thanks, man.” 

“No problem,” JJ says as John B continues his way to his room. JJ looks over his shoulder, and when John B disappears behind the door, he looks back at Kiara. 

“I don’t really know what it’s going to take with him,” JJ says quietly, and Kiara’s lingering smile from watching her dorks fades. She realizes, probably a second too late, that JJ is back to talking about Pope. JJ doesn’t hesitate to give her time to catch up, he just keeps talking. “But we all know you’re one of us, Kie. You just gotta keep showing up to shit, you know? Prove to him that you’re not messing with us.” 

Like a knee jerk reaction, Kiara responds. “I’m not messing with you guys!” 

JJ throws his hands up in defense. “I know, Kie. Trust me, I know. And Pope will, too. You just gotta give him time.”

Kiara takes a deep breath, nodding. _Time._ She could do that. She could give Pope time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> annnnnd the next chapter is: "Pondering the Theological Implications of a Slice of Pizza"


	26. Pondering the Theological Implications of a Slice of Pizza

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i have nothing to say except i've spent way too much time this week trying to figure out if maddie bailey is going to be filming in barbados. 
> 
> like always, thank you to my phenomenal beta reader [lemon_drizzle_cake](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lemon_drizzle_cake/pseuds/lemon_drizzle_cake) for all her help this chapter and enabling me when I try to be funny<3

A week or two go by and, in all honesty, nothing changes. Kiara keeps showing up, JJ and John B keep acting like everything’s normal. And, of course, it’s still pretty frigid between Kiara and Pope.

Kiara wants to sit Pope down and talk to him, but she is also aware that it’s probably the last thing he wants. She’s trying to respect that – she really is, but school is starting on Monday and she knows she’ll have less time to spend around the Chateau when her classes start.

Kiara's trying really hard not to stress about that, but it seems like the start of school is coming far too soon for her taste. She still has yet to decide how she’s going to deal with all her after school activities. Last year, her extracurriculars all but revolved around Sarah, and the last thing Kiara wants right now is a repeat of that. But her mom also won’t let her drop all her extracurriculars at once, so Kiara’s at a stand still. She doesn’t know what Monday will hold. 

It’s also kind of the same thing that’s holding Pope back. When Monday morning comes and Kiara’s back at the Academy, will she fall back in with her Kook friends? Will she and Sarah make up immediately?

Kiara knows the answer to that question like she knows her first name – she’s _never_ falling for that trick again. Sarah’s shown her who she is, and that’s the beginning and end of it. But she doesn’t know how to tell Pope that, or make him believe it, so she mostly just waits. Actions speak louder than words, and all that. 

She shows up, and surfs, and brings them food. When she feels like calling Pope out, she bites her tongue. Usually JJ or John B will send her a look, some sort of reminder that Pope just needs _time._ So, Kiara takes a deep breath and tries to let that be okay. 

But unfortunately, the tension with Pope isn’t the only thing that’s new and unnerving. Sure, JJ and John B have accepted her back, but there’s still things that feel off. There are jokes she doesn’t get, adventures she hadn’t been on, and a whole new way of life for both John B and JJ as they try to run the Chateau without the presence of Big John. Uncle T comes and goes like the wind, always pleasant but different then Big John in most of the ways that matter. Big John was the definition of calm – he’d walk into a room and take the chaos of the boys down about a hundred notches. Uncle T, on the other hand, seems to be the exact type of enabler that the boys don’t need. He hypes them up with crazy stories of his younger years until the boys are talking about surfing the surge in a fucking hurricane and Kiara wants to scream that it’s a terrible idea. 

All that’s fine, usually, because Kiara or Pope can talk them down from the worst of their ideas, even if they aren’t talking themselves. But it’s getting harder and harder to throw them off of their wildest plans, and _even that_ is far from the most frustrating development. 

That title belongs to what Kiara has spitefully labeled _The Weed Thing._

Before Kiara’s Kook Year, the boys and her hadn’t experimented with weed. The Boneyard wasn’t a regular part of their week, and they were in eighth grade. Even on the Cut, it was a little hard to find someone who was willing to sell anything to Middle Schoolers. And, more than that, they had no money for it in the first place. 

Kiara knows that changed a few months into her sabbatical. She knows from the gossip around Figure Eight, from the things she heard around the hallways of the Academy once the Boneyard was fair game. She also knows because, once she comes back, she finds that John B and JJ are more than happy to roll up any day of the week. Pope’s still against it, of course – he occasionally relents and has a beer, but even that is rare. 

In her Kook Year, Kiara had seen a plethora of illicit substances floating around Figure Eight, but she hadn't tried anything herself. Girls at the Academy are supposed to be beacons of society or whatever, and their conservative parents pass down conservative ideals. Sarah and her friends do not touch anything stronger than spiked punch as a general rule. Up until a few weeks ago, Kiara had considered herself among their ranks. 

When she was friends with Sarah, she didn’t really care. It didn’t feel like she was missing out on anything at the time. But now, smoking on the hammock is, like, a sacred tradition for JJ and John B, and she definitely feels like she’s missing something. 

It’s not like Kiara feels pressured to try marijuana by the boys – in fact, it’s the complete freaking opposite. The boys pressure her into _not_ trying marijuana, which is annoying and frustrating in it’s own special way. It’s a guessing game of what excuse they’ll come up with each time Kiara asks to join in. 

Sometimes it’s _we don’t have enough_ or _this strand is too strong for a newbie._ When JJ’s feeling particularly brave, he’ll tell her what she knows is the truth: him and John B think her smoking weed is a bad idea and they don’t want to be the ones to start it. They go as far as to stop smoking in front of her because she asks so relentlessly, which Kiara thinks might actually feel like torture to JJ. 

If there’s one thing Kiara’s learned about herself, it’s that she hates being left out. And even though Pope joins her on the sober side of life, it doesn’t exactly feel like a comfort when he won’t even talk to her. 

She does her research, comes to the Chateau with facts and figures about why the boys should get their heads out of their asses and let her make her own choices. She knows that weed could help with her anxiety and everything that goes on in her head – even goes as far as using that argument against JJ, who she knows understands her mental shit better than anyone. It’s the only argument that almost breaks him, but even that is a futile effort. He just shakes his head and opens another beer for her – like that’s any fucking better. 

It’s another reminder that the boys still view her as an outsider. She’s not a Pogue, she’s a Kook playing a Pogue and the boys don’t want to ruin her reputation. As if it wasn’t already in the fucking garbage in the eyes of the Kooks. 

John B says, one time, already half faded and smiling despite his words, “You have a future, Kie,” as if that future doesn’t feel like a fucking prison. “You shouldn’t get caught up in this shit.” 

Kiara still doesn’t see it as an interference with her future, and she’s certain that smoking a little in her teens will not fuck up any of the plans she has. That argument is weak, though, when Pope – the only one of them really, truly obsessed with their future – refuses to touch the stuff. 

Kiara’s nothing if not persistent, and her newest goal is to find someone to hand her a joint so she can try it. The boys aren’t Brother Theresa, how ever much they try to act like they are. They don’t want to corrupt Kiara, or whatever, but she knows that if she tries weed and proves to them she can handle it, they’ll have to relent. She just needs to find someone willing to share.

And honestly, she knows it won’t be hard. It’ll take five minutes at the Boneyard and batting her eyes at a rich touron who thinks he’ll get lucky if he lets a girl take a hit. Kiara’s not interested in what comes after – she just wants the hits. 

Initially, Kiara doesn’t really jump at the chance to end up back at the Boneyard – that beach forever a reminder of one of her least favorite memories of all time, and she knows there are more and more Kooks flooding the parties as the weeks go by. It’s a culmination of everything Kiara would currently like to avoid, and the first two times the boys extend an invitation to the party, she asks her dad to move her shifts around so she has an excuse not to attend

It might have continued like that indefinitely if she hadn’t come up with her (admittedly hairbrained) scheme. Maybe it’s not the safest option in the world, but Kiara’s determined. Plus, the boys will be around, and she literally trusts them with her life.

Her first Friday back at the Boneyard is just a little bit tumultuous. The boys are excited, as always, and they spend the entire walk to the Boneyard talking loudly. They try to loop Kiara into the conversation, but she’s caught up in her own head about returning to the location of The Big Fight. The boys valiantly attempt to ignore her gloomy attitude, choosing instead to talk excitedly about the fact that some senior from the Cut managed to get his hands on three kegs. 

Kiara’s stomach is in knots when they step onto the sand, and she tries not to focus too much on what happened months ago. Instead, she ditches the boys when they go to play some convoluted drinking game, and she focuses on finding her mark: a stupid rich kid with enough weed to share.

That’s how she ends up talking to an asshole named _Fletcher._ Rich touron from some state that sounds cold and miserable, salmon pants and a fucking Vineyard Vine quarter zip. He’s good at rolling, though – or, he says he is. Kiara’s not exactly an expert, but he seems less practiced than JJ despite being a few years older. He’s a lot of bravado and zero brain cells, but he’s chill enough that he passes Kiara a blunt without even asking. Kiara’s eyes light up when he does. 

“Thanks,” she says, hoping it sounds casual. Fletcher doesn’t give her a second look before he continues his story of skinny dipping at his lake house back home. 

Kiara lifts the joint to her lips, breathing in deeply. And, almost immediately, it completely goes to shit – she starts coughing so hard, Fletcher pounds his hand against her back, laughing. In retrospect, this was probably, like, an omen, or something.

“Is this your first time smoking?” Fletcher jokes, and Kiara’s too busy trying to breathe to even think of lying. 

She nods her head, still coughing, and misses as Fletcher looks down at the blunt in her hand in horror. Someone else says _shit, that’s strong for the first time,_ and Fletcher’s eyes go even wider. 

“Shit–” he says, his mouth hanging open. Kiara’s pretty sure he already forgot her name. “You coulda warned a guy.”

Kiara doesn’t answer – her eyes are still kind of watering, but she’s stopped coughing at least. When she lifts the blunt up to her lips for a second hit, she sends Fletcher a half-convincing smile.

––––––

An hour later, Kiara is feeling great. Better than great – Kiara feels like she is _floating_. It’s no wonder JJ and John B wanted to keep all the weed to themselves, and she doesn’t blame them at all. If she knew how it felt, she would have hoarded her own supply like a squirrel hoards nuts. 

_Fuck._ She must be really high, because the image of JJ and John B as a pair of squirrels, hoarding joints instead of acorns, is fucking _hilarious._ She giggles out loud despite herself, garnering a few weird looks from the girls who are sitting across the fire from her. 

She feels kind of awkward, sitting across the fire from a group of Academy girls after everything that has happened. She doesn’t know any of them too well – they’re seniors, friends of Rafe’s that would occasionally hang in the peripheral of Kiara’s social circle when she was with Sarah. 

Now, they just look like killjoys, eyeing her suspiciously because she finds something funny. Whatever. Kiara’s sick of them – she just wants to vibe. 

_Vibe._ That’s what John B and JJ always say. 

It takes a little bit of effort to get out of her seat, but eventually she’s on her feet, wondering between the Kooks and the Tourons to where she thinks her boys are. She finds John B sitting next to a girl she doesn’t recognize, and she spots Pope a few people away. Part of her wants to go over to Pope and tell him to unclench. Light up and chill out. 

Thankfully, even in her current headspace, she can recognize that it’s probably a bad idea. 

John B seems happy to see her. His smile fades, though, when she stumbles over to him, giggling. 

“Kie, are you okay?” he asks, standing up and reaching out a hand to steady her when she’s close enough. 

“I’m… vibing, John B,” She says, and it only takes John B a second to analyze her strange movements and hooded eyes. 

“Shit, Kie,” he says, trying and failing to get her to sit down. “What did you take?” 

She sees Pope turn his attention to her, his eyes hard at first and then – if the weed isn’t messing with her – something like worried. 

“ _Nothing,”_ Kiara breathes out, giggling a little more.

“Holy fuck,” John B says, rubbing his forehead. Pope takes a few steps towards them, coming up behind John B’s shoulder and watching her warily. 

“She’s completely roasted,” Pope says in disbelief. Kiara shakes her head, trying to act innocent, but more guilty giggling gives her away. 

She relents, finally, because even she could see it was in vain. “It’s just a little bit of weed, John B,” she says, slapping John B on the shoulder. “Nothing that ever hurt anybody.”

“How did none of us notice you smoking?” John B asks Kiara, who just shrugs. “JJ’s gonna flip his shit.” 

“We don’t have to tell him,” Pope offers, still watching Kiara closely. Both John B and Pope stare at Kiara for a second.

“Yeah, I think he might know,” John B says helplessly.   
  
“No way we can hide this,” Pope agrees. Kiara doesn’t know what she’s doing to make them so certain JJ will be able to tell, but she thinks it might have to do with the whole _feeling like I’m floating_ thing. 

“You guys are so _stressed._ You should vibe with me,” Kiara says, grasping John B’s hand and trying to convey how important this is to her. She just wants to vibe with the Pogues. John B still looks too stressed for Kiara’s taste, so she turns to Pope. “Pope, you need to _vibe.”_

“Yeah, I think I’m good,” Pope says, staring at Kiara like she has three heads. Maybe later, a more sober Kiara will appreciate the fact that it’s the most words he’s said to her in weeks. High Kiara doesn’t have that presence of mind to think that far. “Do you think we should find him?” 

“He went off with Amanda…” John B trails off, turning around to look around the fringes of the party. 

“JJ’s with _Amanda?”_ Kiara says, aghast, and John B turns to look at her in surprise. 

“You know Amanda?” John B asks, and Kiara’s taken aback for a second. 

“Amanda from English Class?” Kiara asks, tilting her head to one side. 

“Amanda from Arkansas,” Pope corrects. 

“ _Oh,”_ Kiara says, nodding her head. “No, I guess not.” 

John B stares at Kiara for a second, and Kiara’s kind of sick of him doing that. She’s about to tell him as much, but then he’s shaking his head and nodding to one of the larger pieces of driftwood he had been using as a bench. 

“Why don’t you sit down, Kie,” he says, before he moves his eyes around the party again. “Tonight sure took a turn.” 

Kiara doesn’t really know what to make of the second half of his statement, but she’s more than happy to sit down. She plops down on the driftwood, toeing her sandals off and digging her feet into the sand. 

John B and Pope seem to be discussing something, but Kiara’s not interested enough to pay them any mind. She’s just happy to sit around the fire and watch the people of the Boneyard mill around. If there was less light, she would have really liked to look at the stars. 

Halfway down the beach, some Kook asshole trips over his own feet and ends up rolling in the sand. Kiara giggles out loud because, honestly, it’s one of the funniest things she’s ever seen. John B and Pope look at her for a second, and she swats her hand in the air at them. 

“Stop looking at me weird!” she orders, and John B nods his head once.   
  


“I’m gonna go find JJ.” 

  
“Good plan,” Pope agrees, probably before he realizes that will leave him and Kiara alone. 

John B stalks off down the beach, heading towards the tree line along the sand, and Pope only hesitates for a few seconds before he decides to sit next to Kiara on the driftwood. Kiara doesn’t have any qualms about laying her head on his shoulder as soon as he’s next to her. 

She’s always been cuddly when drunk, so in her hazy brain, this doesn’t seem like a new revelation. Pope tenses as soon as they are in contact. 

“I feel good, Pope,” Kiara says, staring blankly at the fire. 

“Good for you, Kiara,” Pope shoots back, but his tone doesn’t sound kind. 

“It’s been a while since I felt good.” 

Pope doesn’t respond to that, and Kiara doesn’t have anything else to say. They sit like that for a while, Pope rigid as a board and Kiara laughing whenever anything even moderately funny happens. 

When John B comes back, he has JJ in tow. Kiara lifts her head off Pope’s shoulder, smiling at them brightly. 

“Hello boys!” she giggles, and JJ shoots John B a look. John B holds his hands up as if to say _this is not my fault!_

JJ turns back to Kiara, looking at her like he’s suspicious of her next movements. 

“How’re you feeling, Kie?” he asks tentatively, and Kiara mulls it over for a second. 

_“Euphoric,”_ she finally decides, dragging the word out, and JJ looks up at the sky for a few seconds. If Kiara didn’t know better, she’d think he might be praying. 

When JJ stops looking at the sky, he moves his eyes between Pope and John B. “Literally, how did this happen?” 

Pope stands up suddenly from his seat, throwing Kiara a little off balance and nearly sending her flying. The boys aren’t really paying attention to her, though, too wrapped up in arguing amongst themselves. 

“I’m not here to babysit her, JJ,” Pope bites out. “In fact, I didn’t want her here at all.” 

“Guys, this is not the time to start another fight,” John B sighs, and both of them look at him. Kiara chooses that moment to stand up, resting a hand on JJ and Pope’s arms. 

“You need to chill out,” she implores, giggling. They stare at her like she’s out of her mind. 

“You gotta be fucking kidding me,” JJ mutters. “Kie, what did you take?”

“My friend…” Kiara says, turning around the party and trying to find the group she had smoked with. “I think his name was Fletcher.” 

“You think his name was Fletcher,” JJ says, clearly exasperated. “Well, great, perfect. Sounds exactly like an asshole name. Did you smoke with _Fletcher?_ ” 

Kiara shrugs. “Yeah.” 

JJ looks at John B sharply. “And where is Fletcher? Do we even know who Fletcher is?” 

John B looks at her. Again, Kiara shrugs unhelpfully. “He was over there,” she says, gesturing vaguely to the other side of the fire. “Or maybe there,” she says, gesturing in the opposite direction. “But I think he left.”

“Great,” JJ bites out between his teeth. 

“He was from someplace cold,” Kiara says, tilting her head to one side. “Maybe New York? I don’t know – he had the whole salmon pants thing going on.” 

The three boys stare at her like she’s speaking gibberish. 

“What?” Kiara demands, and she can’t tell if JJ is grimacing or trying not to smile. 

“Salmon pants? He had fish on his pants?” 

Kiara reaches out and swats at him, missing her mark completely. “Salmon _the color,_ asshole,” she says, and JJ laughs at her words. He laughs harder when she stumbles forward after not hitting him, the momentum from her swing throwing her off balance.

John B and Pope both seem to relax a little, sharing a look with each other while JJ rubs his forehead. 

“Alright,” JJ breathes out. “Well, how bad can weed from Fletcher Fish Pants be?” 

Kiara giggles loudly – probably obnoxiously – at that, and all the tension the boys had seems to fade. Or, well, most of it fades. Kiara can’t really tell, anyways.

They stick around the party a little longer. Pope and John B go back to where they were before Kiara interrupted them, but JJ sits next to her on the driftwood, listening to her babble about god knows what. Occasionally, he’ll egg her on, saying something stupid to send her into a fit of giggles, or asking her about a wild conspiracy theory that sends her eyes wild and her inebriated mind wandering. He gets probably way too much enjoyment out of it.

The party’s in full swing when Kiara’s stomach grumbles for the first time. She lays a hand on her stomach, and then shoves JJ’s shoulder. He’s still laughing about her weed-induced rant about the Mattress Firm Money Laundering Scheme. 

“Hey,” she says. “I’m, like, starving.” 

“Ah, the munchies,” JJ says, his laughter not completely dying out. “Unfortunately, there’s a lack of food around the Boneyard.” 

Kiara looks around the party, and then back at JJ. “How would you feel….” she says slowly, “about heading back to the Chateau and ordering a few pizzas?” JJ hesitates for a second, looking at the fire. “I’ll pay,” she adds. 

JJ looks at her from the side of his eyes. He laughs, shaking his head. “Yeah, yeah,” he drains the last of his beer. “I could go for a slice myself.” 

JJ stands up and offers Kiara his hand, looking down the line of people to where John B and Pope are seated, surrounded by a small group of Tourons. 

“Hey!” JJ yells, just loud enough that both John B and Pope look up. “We’re gonna head back.” 

“You’re taking Kie back home?” Pope asks, eying both of them. 

John B looks between the girl sitting next to him and JJ. “Do you want us to come with you?” he asks. 

JJ shakes his head. “Nah, man. Divide and conquer, right?”

Kiara shoves at his shoulder. “Don’t be weird.” 

JJ takes a few steps forward, clapping Pope on the shoulder. “Make sure John B doesn’t throw himself off a cliff or something,” he warns, and Pope looks warily at the two of them.

“Right,” Pope says slowly. “No cliff jumping. Good luck with Mary Jane.” 

–––--

JJ would like to punch whoever the fuck Fletcher is. 

Kiara, it turns out, is just a little bit infuriating when high. It had been kind of endearingly funny at the Boneyard, but walking her home is a whole other story. She’s less afraid of oncoming traffic than she should be, and way more interested in balancing on the yellow line in the middle of the road. The roads of Kildare are mostly empty in the middle of the night, so JJ indulges her, holding her hand as she puts one foot in front of the other, walking along the yellow paint and, more often than not, stepping out of line. When a car comes, he pulls her quickly to the side of the road and tries not to cause a major accident. Kiara thinks it’s hilarious. 

It’s slow going but eventually, the Chateau’s driveway comes into view and JJ breathes a sigh of relief. 

Kiara doesn’t make it into the Chateau – she beelines right for the hammock, nearly turning the entire thing upside down when she sits down. Despite the frustration, JJ’s got to admit it’s a little cute when Kiara looks up over the edge of the hammock with wide eyes, asking JJ to join her without words. 

JJ sighs and walks around the trees. “Move over, Raggedy Ann,” he jokes, and Kiara giggles way too loudly at the joke. Kiara keeps giggling as she scoots over on the hammock, sending the entire thing rocking dangerous. 

JJ’s arms shoot out, holding it still so it won’t dump Kiara onto the ground. Kiara looks up at him with wide eyes, her giggles turning into a full laugh as she breathes out _“woah.”_

“Shit, Kie,” JJ says, carefully sitting down on the hammock and trying to fight the smile tugging on his lips. “You’re really on another one tonight, aren’t you?”

Kiara turns her head to look at him. _“Euphoric,”_ she says again, and JJ looks away, rolling his eyes but unable to hide his smile any longer. Kiara still thinks it’s the funniest thing ever. 

She looks back up at the sky, and JJ pulls his vape pen out of his pocket. He lifts it to his lips, breathing in as Kiara crinkles her nose at him. He holds it out to her, blowing the cloud of smoke up into the air as Kiara hesitates to take it. 

“It’s not weed,” JJ says, turning it over in his fingers. “Just imitation mango.” 

Kiara ends up taking it from his fingers and mimicking his movements, blowing a cloud of smoke into the air. She could use a little bit of practice, but JJ nods approvingly anyway. 

The hammock forces them close to each other, their sides pressed up against each other at every point. It’s warm and comfortable, and JJ lifts his arm over Kiara’s head. She doesn’t question it, immediately moving to lay against his side, her head resting on his chest. 

The stars above Kildare look overwhelming tonight. It’s dark enough, and the clear sky has a thousand visible stars dotting it like a painting. Kiara raises JJ’s vape in her hand, tracing a pattern in the stars that JJ can’t discern. 

“Remember when I went to California?” Kiara asks as she drops her hand, and JJ hums. He vaguely remembers a similar night, years ago, when she had finally gotten home from her longest vacation yet. “I never want to live in a place where you can’t see the stars.” 

“You can’t see the stars in California?” JJ asks, and Kiara nods against his chest. 

“Too much light pollution,” she informs him, and JJ breathes out a laugh.

“Is California not on your approved travel list anymore?” JJ teases, but Kiara mulls the question over in her head seriously.

“Nah, California is cool. The surfing would be bomb.” Kiara pauses, handing the vape back to JJ. “And like, fuck capitalism, but Disneyland is pretty cool.” 

JJ actually laughs at that. “I remember you were a fan. Doesn’t seem very _eat the rich_ to me.” 

“Unfortunately, I’m a simple woman,” Kiara sighs, and JJ would like to argue that point and remind her that she’s very much _not simple._ In fact, she might actually be the _most complicated._ But he senses that conversation might not be the best one to have when Kiara’s zonked – or maybe ever, honestly – so he shuts his mouth. “I’m a sucker for a happy ending.” 

“Well, shit,” JJ says, bringing the vape back up to his lips. He sends another column of smoke up into the night sky before he finishes his thought. “Aren’t we all?”

Kiara doesn’t answer him, and he guesses it doesn’t really matter. It was a rhetorical question, anyways. Instead, they sit in silence for a few minutes, passing back and forth the vape until Kiara can’t stand the smell of imitation mango anymore.

“Do you still want to go to California?” Kiara whispers when it’s been too quiet for too long. She says it like it’s a secret, like she doesn’t want the universe to hear her question.

“I’d like to go fucking anywhere,” JJ says, probably a little too truthfully. It’s late and he’s tired and even though he’s almost painfully sober – he hadn’t had much more than a beer when John B had come over to him, warning him that _uh, well, you see, Kiara may or may not have gotten into something_ – he feels like his lips are a little too loose tonight. Like maybe he’s drunk on having Kiara back. Someone to talk to that’s not John B or Pope. They’re like brothers to him but, god, a conversation like this would be painful with either of them, and for different reasons. Some things are just easier with Kiara, and he’s missed it.

“Yeah?” Kiara asks, dragging JJ back to the original question, and he shrugs. 

“Yeah,” he hums. “Just… I don’t know.” 

JJ’s quiet for a while, trying to find words to describe how he’s feeling. It’s quiet for long enough that he’s pretty sure Kiara has forgotten the conversation entirely, until she finally speaks up. 

“You want something different,” she says. It’s not a question – it’s like Kiara knows exactly what he’s trying to say. 

“Yeah,” JJ says, fiddling with the vape. “I guess Kildare just doesn’t have a lot for me.”

“It has us,” Kiara says, looking up at him. 

“Yeah, that’s true,” JJ says, and he tries not to let himself ruin the mood. 

Sometimes, JJ wonders if Kiara’s outlook on the three of them has changed during her Kook year. Kiara had always seemed blind to the reality of their future, before. She always assumed the boys would get out of the Cut exactly like she intended to get out of Kildare. She always thought their situation was temporary. 

And maybe it is temporary, for Pope. But JJ doesn’t really see a way off this island for either him or John B – not really, anyways. It’s the wrong time to be thinking about shit like that, though. He doesn’t want to ruin this moment by harping on the fact that, eventually, the Pogues will all leave Kildare and he doesn’t know where that will leave him. It’s years away, anyways. 

“I suppose you guys are enough,” he teases, in an attempt to lighten the mood.

Kiara snorts. “You _suppose.”_

“I don’t know, bro, right now all Kildare seems to have to offer me is Horny John B and High Kie.”

_“Gross,”_ Kiara says, shoving him away, pretending to gag. “Please don’t talk to me about John B that way. It’s like talking about my _brother.”_

JJ laughs, twirling the vape around in his fingers. “Your _brother_ is trying to get it on with Trina Hardy.” 

“I will castrate you,” Kiara warns. 

“Sexy,” JJ says, wagging his eyebrows, and Kiara shoves him again. “Do you think Pope has broken out in hives yet? He’s solely in charge of John B right now.” 

JJ can tell Kiara’s high is starting to mellow out from the lack of giggling, but she’s still pretty thoroughly inebriated – evidence by the fact that she doesn’t show any hint of tension when JJ brings up Pope. 

“Definitely. And he’s not even a fan of Trina,” Kiara says absentmindedly. “She made fun of the chess club in middle school.” 

“What a bitch,” JJ says, letting out a low whistle. “John B sure knows how to pick ‘em, doesn’t he.”

Kiara looks up with stern eyes. “Says you. You were about to hook up with Amanda.” 

JJ lifts his eyebrows. “What’s wrong with Amanda?”

“She’s from _Arkansas.”_

JJ’s only more confused. “She was hot. And there’s nothing wrong with Arkansas.” 

“You’ve never been to Arkansas before!” Kiara accuses, and JJ throws it right back at her. 

“Neither have you!” 

Kiara huffs, folding her arms across her chest. JJ takes a celebratory drag from his vape pen. It’s not every day he bests Kiara in a debate – he’ll ignore the fact that she’s high for now. 

“If you’re jealous, Kie, you can just say so,” he teases, and Kiara looks up at him flabbergasted. He’s gotta admit, Kiara’s reactions to his bolder statements only egg him on. He upped his game in the last year, and the shock on Kiara’s face every time he toes the line is a win in and of itself. 

“I’m not jealous,” she says incredulously, leaning back against his shoulder. “Worried for your sanity, maybe, but not jealous.” 

Well, JJ’s sanity is pretty much in the shitter already, because he can’t stop thinking about why Kiara called John B her _brother_ a few moments ago but hasn’t made the same argument with him. He doesn’t want to read too much into it, but his brain picked up on it and won’t let it go.

_She’s high,_ he reminds himself, and then he puts on a smirk. “Whatever you say, Kiara. Whatever you say.” 

He feels Kiara get even more flustered, and he kind of wants to keep poking at her, but she doesn’t let him. Without much warning, Kiara leaps out of the hammock, quicker than JJ thought possible in her current state. It nearly sends him flying, _again,_ and JJ decides that the hammock might be off limits to High Kiara until she can manage herself. JJ’s not stupid, he knows this isn’t the last time Kiara’s going to smoke, and he also knows that at some point, she’ll have more of a tolerance. 

“Where are you going?” JJ says, worried that he’s _actually_ pissed her off this time. 

Kiara turns to him, smiling even if there’s a flash of something else in her eyes for a second. “We came to the Chateau to get pizza,” she reminds him. “Or did you forget?”

With that, Kiara turns away from him, walking across the yard to the door of the Chateau. JJ clambers out of the hammock, struggling to catch up with her as she makes her way to the kitchen. There’s a small plethora of take out menus held up by magnets on the fridge, and Kiara runs her finger over them until she finds her favorite pizza place. 

“Aha!” she says, pulling the menu off the fridge and dropping the magnet to the floor. JJ rolls his eyes, bending down to pick it up as Kiara pulls out her phone. Kiara wanders out of the kitchen as she begins placing her order, and JJ puts the menu back up on the fridge. 

He doesn’t pay attention to what Kiara says on the phone, and later, when he’s accepting 5 pizza boxes from the delivery man, he realizes that was a mistake. 

“Kie,” JJ says in disbelief, looking at her over the top of the stack of boxes in his arms. “This is way too much pizza.” 

Kiara looks at him from where she’s seated on the edge of the pull out couch. It’s pulled into a bed, as it usually is these days, and she has JJ’s favorite blanket draped over her legs. 

Kiara shrugs. “What if Pope and John B want some?” she says, and JJ places the pizza boxes on the kitchen table. He stares at the tower of boxes. And, well, the three of them can eat their fair share of food. But still, it’s a fuck ton of pizza. 

JJ decides not to argue, just nods along. “Fair enough,” he says, opening the top box. “Maybe Pope will want an entire pizza to himself.” 

“Exactly,” Kiara says, not picking up on the teasing in his voice. She makes a grabbing motion for the box and JJ complies, handing it off to her. She smiles brightly as she opens it up, clapping like a child when she sets it on the bed. 

JJ sits next to her as she picks up her first slice of pizza, and for a few minutes, they eat in silence, shoving pieces of pizza into their mouths. 

“I’m thirsty,” Kiara says after about her third piece of pizza, and JJ has to physically restrain himself from making a joke at her expense. He’s still not entirely sure if she’s pissed at him for his last bold comment, and he really doesn’t want to find out what High And Pissed Off Kiara looks like.

JJ gestures with his current pizza slice to the kitchen. “The tap’s right there,” he says and Kiara stares at it for a second. “You can get a glass of water if you want.” 

_“Yeah,”_ Kiara says absentmindedly, almost like JJ had told her something groundbreaking. A few seconds later, she lifts herself up from the pull out, making her way into the kitchen. 

JJ shakes his head as she grabs a glass, pulling out his phone to check his messages. He doesn’t have emergency texts from Pope, so he figures everything is going smoothly at the Boneyard. 

When he looks back up from his phone, Kiara’s staring down at the sink, watching the water go down the drain. 

“Kie?” JJ prompts, and Kiara looks over at him quickly. “You’re getting a glass of water.” 

“Right,” Kiara says, snapping out of her trance as much as she can while still stoned out of her mind. “A glass of water.” 

She manages to fill her glass up and make it back to the pull out couch without a major incident. Honestly, given her current state, it’s something of a miracle. 

She sits on the couch and downs the entire glass in one go. When she’s finished, she stares sadly at the empty glass. 

JJ takes the hint. “Give me that,” he says, hopping up from the bed and refilling it for her. He turns back to living room just in time to see Kiara pick up another slice.

“Go crazy, go stupid…” Kiara says sagely when she notices JJ looking at her. She toasts him with her floppy piece of pizza. “Everything in your life has led up to this moment. Isn’t that wild?”

“Jesus Christ,” JJ groans as he walks back with the glass of water. Kiara barely registers his discontent.  
  


“I’m serious! Like, everything I’ve ever done has culminated in me eating this slice of pizza.” She bites into the pizza for effect. _“Wild.”_

––––-

It takes a half of a pizza, two more glasses of water, and about another hour for Kiara to start functioning like a human again. By the time she’s halfway sober, her and JJ are sprawled on the pull out couch, staring at the ceiling in almost silence. 

“Hey, Kie,” JJ says once he thinks she’s stable enough to handle a conversation. Kiara hums to let him know she’s listening. “You can’t take weed from just anyone.” 

Kiara lifts herself onto her elbows, glaring down at him. “Why, because you say so?” she bites back, and JJ rolls his eyes at her. At least Kiara’s sober enough to give him attitude. 

“I’m serious, Kie. There’s shady shit floating around the Boneyard. You don’t know what it could be laced with,” he warns, looking away from her.

Kiara huffs out a breath, flopping back onto the bed. “Alright. Where do you suppose I get my weed, then?” 

JJ shrugs his shoulder. “My cousin grows his shit, I know what’s in it. I’ll give you whatever you want, but I just – I would feel better if you were smoking his shit.” 

Kiara flips over so she’s on her stomach, facing JJ. “Does this mean I can smoke with you guys?” 

Her smile is infectious, even though it’s not the giddy look she had on her face an hour or so ago. JJ smiles up at the ceiling but doesn’t answer. 

“Oh, _come on,”_ Kiara whines. “I handled myself well tonight!” 

“You almost got hit by, like, 3 separate cars on the way home,” JJ points out. “And you charged five pizzas to your parents credit card – I wouldn’t exactly say you handled yourself _well.”_

Kiara stares at the pizza boxes on the table. She sighs. “Yeah, I don’t know how to explain that one to my parents.” 

“The boys were really hungry?” JJ says, mimicking her voice. Kiara glares at him, but shrugs her shoulders. 

“That’ll have to do. Besides, I avoided a major disaster. I call this firmly a win, and evidence that I can smoke with you guys.” 

JJ groans. “One track mind, even zonked.” 

Kiara shoves at his shoulder. “Hey! I’m feeling significantly less _zonked.”_

“Wanna go watch the water run down the drain for 10 more minutes?” 

“Fuck off, JJ,” Kiara says, but she’s smiling as wide as he is. 

“I’d prefer that level of High Kie. She had less attitude,” JJ teases, and Kiara’s jaw drops. 

“The only thing men have is the _audacity,_ ” she says, and JJ breaks out laughing. Kiara joins him, and both of them are silent for a second after it dies out. 

“Sooo...” Kiara draws out. 

“Oh my god, Kie,” JJ rubs his face with his hand.

“I’m just saying – if you want me to smoke your cousin’s weed, you’re going to have to learn to share.” 

JJ looks over at her. He doesn’t want to admit it, but he’s a little peeved that the first time Kiara smoked wasn’t with him. He knows him and John B have been playing a dangerous game the last few weeks, trying to keep Kiara away from their new illicit activity. But he also didn’t expect Kiara to grab the nearest blunt at the first Boneyard Party she attended. To be honest, that one’s on him. He should know by now that Kiara’s a go-getter. 

“Yeah, I guess that’s fair,” JJ relents, even though he’s not really sure he wants to. “Just let me know when you feel like smoking again so you don’t end up with whatever garbage is at the Boneyard.”

Kiara contemplates it for a second. “Hey JJ?” 

JJ sighs. “Yes, Kie?” 

“I think I want to smoke tomorrow.” 

JJ laughs out loud, turning to look at Kiara. She’s smiling shyly at him, and JJ kind of feels his heart skip a beat.   
  


He ignores it, holding his hand out to clasp Kiara’s in the Pogue handshake. 

“That’s my fucking girl,” he says proudly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> annnnnnd the next chapter is: "The Human Condition Is All But Defined By A Ubiquitous Anxiety"


End file.
